


Cover Up the Sun

by Mikkeneko



Series: The Great Subconscious Club [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor 2: The Dark World, X-Men (Movies)
Genre: Abduction, Alternate Canon, Angst, Fantastic Racism, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Genderswap, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Torture, Loki would probably enjoy teaching actually, Memory Alteration, Past Child Abuse, Rehabilitation, Snowball Fight, Xavier continues to be manipulative but it's all in good cause, consensual telepathic therapy, oh look it's a sequel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-15
Updated: 2014-05-31
Packaged: 2018-01-01 15:28:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 82,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1045554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mikkeneko/pseuds/Mikkeneko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Following the invasion of Asgard by Malekith the Accursed, Loki seeks shelter in the one place in the Nine Realms he knows he will be welcome: Charles Xavier's School for the Gifted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The title for this fic comes from the K's Choice song, "Hide," from the album The Great Subconscious Club.
> 
>    
>  _Watch me_  
>  _You knew I've always been_  
>  _In a hurry to contaminate what's clean_  
>  _To cover up the sun_  
>  _You thought you had it all_  
>  _Lost your way before the fall_  
>  _You should have killed me_  
>  _You should have tried_  
>  _You better hide_  
>  _Hide_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Thorsday everyone. It's been one week since **Thor: The Dark World** came out, so have the first chapter of a new fic. 
> 
> **Spoiler alert:** This fic contains spoilers for **The Dark World**... _sort_ of.
> 
> The first fic in this series, A Villain State of Mind, was meant to start after the end of Avengers and end before the beginning of TDW. At that point in time, I had only vague guesses and scanty information as to what the events of TDW would be. I had actually intended for quite some time now to write this second fic following the events of Malekith's invasion, but I couldn't do so until I knew just how close or far to the mark my guesses would turn out to be.
> 
> As it turned out: pretty close, but there were still some discrepancies in the timeline of 'Great Subconscious Club' that would not fit with the events of Thor 2 as they played out in the movie. So this chapter recaps the events of Thor 2 _as they would have happened in this version of the timeline._ Some things are the same, but others have been altered to fit the changes that came from the Bifrost not being repaired, Loki not being imprisoned and very little time at all having passed since Avengers.
> 
> In this timeline Loki still goes to Svartalfheim and still fakes his death, then returns in disguise to report his 'death' to Odin afterwards; but instead of staying on Asgard afterwards, Loki instead chooses to return to Midgard in secret.
> 
> Also, I changed the name of Malekith's darkness phlebotinum, because really? _The Aether?_ Is that supposed to conjure images of insidious evil and unfathomable darkness? Pfff.

Charles sat at his desk long into the night, a single lamp burning behind him throwing illumination onto his worktop. Fatigue tugged at the edges of his mind, but he ignored it with long and ready practice. There had been another riot today, in Illinois; ever since the alien invasion over New York and the emergence of the Avengers, anti-mutant sentiment had been on the rise again. Some people felt that with the Avengers on the scene, there was no more need for mutant protectors of the populace; others thought that the next move of the Avengers would get to work cleaning up mutants, and thought to get a jump on the practice. Some even blamed the mutants for the appearance of the aliens themselves - there was no logic to it, and yet there it was.

He didn't blame the Avengers for it. There was no point, really - they hadn't intended this result, and anti-mutant sentiment tended to surge at the slightest provocation. An ugly eruption of mutant powers somewhere in the world - a series of bad storms, or other disasters which could be blamed on mutant powers - even a hit to the economy could cause the smoldering resentment of the human populace to flare up, seeking the nearest target to vent their rage.

Charles could understand it. Oh, he'd seen into their heads, so he knew exactly what they were thinking. But he didn't have to like it.

Every time this happened Charles would put in the longest hours, working like a man possesed to try to control the damage. And every time this happened Charles would lie awake yet longer into the night, staring at the ceiling and wondering: had he done everything that he could? Should he have spent more time with Cerebro, finding mutants who were in the danger zone and pulling them to safety? _You couldn't know who was in danger._ Should he have made more press appearances, soothing over the violence and hate with honeyed words? _They never listen._ Should he have spent more time training his X-men, that they could respond to riots as soon as they broke out and before they could spread to do more damage, take more lives? _You have done all you can for them; they need to be independent now._ Should he be spending more time with his younger students, counseling them and comforting those whose all-too-real terrors were called upon every time news of another riot breached the school?

The ceiling never had any answers for him.

A faint impression washed over Charles' mind, something between a taste and a smell: a whiff of ashes, as though smoke had just blown across his face. Puzzled Charles paused in his work for a moment and glanced up, looking around: was a window open somewhere? Perhaps Logan was visiting again, and smoking his horrendously fragrant cigars despite all the importuning of Charles' secretary that this office was a no-smoking zone.

Then the door to his office opened, despite the fact that not only should the door have been locked, but neither the vigilant young mutant guarding his outer office nor the building's state-of-the-art security should have allowed it. A figure slipped through it like a shadow, small and slim and dressed in dark clothes that blended seamlessly with the night. Only one splash of color stood out: a shock of bright red hair that floated about the intruder's head, framing a face that was young and ageless at once, coldly and emotionlessly beautiful. Charles recognized the young woman's face from a personnel file in Nick Fury's computers: Natasha Romanov, the Black Widow. Spy, infiltration expert and assassin extraordinaire.

"Good evening, Professor," she said. "I hope I'm not intruding."

And yet no matter the _face_ before him, Charles recognized the _mind_ that had just stepped into his office. It was bright, jagged, larger-than-life; it fragmented into pieces that filled the space about it, spilling out from the small body that failed to contain it. It was from that mind that spilled the scent of ash and the taste of blood, brief whispering flickers of violence and smug satisfaction and boundless grief.

Charles smiled, a real and deep expression of relief and happiness. "Loki," he said. "It's good to see you. I hadn't expected to see you again so soon."

It had been two months since Charles had last seen Loki, striding away through a doorway in space framed by the light of an alien sun. He'd only known Loki for a little more than a week before that, but it had been a very _intense_ week of diving inside the alien's brain, attempting to free him from the morass of nightmares and madness that had overcome him. Despite the comparatively short time they'd known each other Charles had become very fond of Loki, and when the call had come from off-world for Loki to return to Asgard to fight off the invasion of Malekith the accursed, Charles had bid him farewell with sadness, hope and fear sharing equal space in his heart. Sadness to see him go; hope that he would rise to the heights of his true potential; and fear that he would fall back into his furious, hurtful, and self-destructive ways.

In the time he had been gone Charles had not forgotten him, but he had put aside thoughts of him for a time. With Loki on Asgard and Charles here on Earth, there was little he could do to help. Even Lilandra, empress of the Shi'ar, could not see or reach into the corner of the universe where the rest of the Nine Realms resided. Charles had, over the years, come to recognize when a teacher could coach and push and guide and advise, and when he had to just step back and let the student go.

The face of the Black Widow broke into an unwilling smile, a laugh startled out of her in a that did not belong with the frame. "I suppose I should have known better," Loki said, now in his own voice, contrasting weirdly with the face he wore but resonating perfectly with his psychic aura. "You have proven immune to all my tricks." He stepped forward, gesturing with one hand, and the image of the tiny Russian woman melted away into his own form: tall, dark, gaunt and pale, dressed in foreign armor and wearing a tattered aura of fatigue about him like a shroud.

"I take it from your appearance here that the war is won?" Charles said, folding his work tablet away and putting it aside. He rested his hands on the table before him and really _looked_ at him, taking in the level of his skin as well as the shape of the thoughts and feelings that swirled restlessly around him. Loki seemed... more centered, somehow, than the last time Charles had seen him. More centered and more calm, and yet also ragged, weighed down with a deep fatigue of the soul and a fraying constitution. The flame of his bright mind was guttering low, dangerously so, and Charles was more than dismayed to see it.

Yet he'd come back. He'd survived the dangers, whatever they were, and he'd come back to Earth of his own free will. That was two great spots of hope from which Loki could rebuild, with Xavier's help. That he had returned to Earth implied both that he'd defeated whatever menace had threatened Asgard (obviously, else he'd not have come back at all and Charles would probably have a very different problem on his mind) but also that he did not feel comfortable remaining there despite having triumphed. Had he still not reconciled with his mother, father and brother? It seemed not, or at least not fully. "How was your reception in Asgard?"

"Oh, it was absolutely marvelous," Loki said, his voice drenched in withering sarcasm. "Why, they were so _thrilled_ to see me that I was nearly thrown into a jail cell within minutes of my arrival on Asgard, and no less than three of my brother's dear companions threatened me with death before the first night had ended.

"As Thor so humbly requested of me, I did my duty in getting the genie back in the bottle, and everything could go back to normal. Asgard stands as grand and golden as ever, perhaps with a few more scorch marks and a couple of dents here and there, but the Realm Eternal will endure as it ever has and they may happen to be under the impression that I'm dead right now," Loki admitted in a rush.

"Dead?" Charles repeated, startled. The air around Loki bubbled with a mixture of guilt and sly pride for having pulled off such a clever trick. "Now, whyever would they think that?"

Loki scowled. "I thought it might put them off my scent for a while," he grumbled. "I wished to be left alone, so that I could come and go as I pleased. Thor might have made vague, sweeping statements about penance and pardons, but it was clear that the All-Father, once he awoke, had other ideas."

The explanation came easily enough, but it was clear from Loki's thoughts that there was far more behind Loki's flight than his flippant words indicated. Charles caught a sense of frustration and bitter hurt, surprise and amazed warmth all roiling on a sea of deep, deep grief.

"Why don't you tell me what happened, Loki?" Charles said. "Starting from the beginning."

"What, can't you just read my thoughts and find out?" Loki sniped. The words were aggressive, almost accusing, but Charles could tell from the complex tangle of thoughts and feelings in his mind that he meant it sincerely. For all that he was a master of words, there were still things inside himself that were hard for him to articulate. It was much easier if Charles could just _know_ what he thought and felt without Loki having to say it, without having to speak aloud of what he perceived as weakness and vulnerability.

"I would still like to hear you tell it," Charles coaxed him. "Putting it to words may help you sort it all out in your own mind; besides, there are many concepts in your mind with which I'm not familiar. The last time I saw you, Thor had called you back to request your aid in breaking a siege over Asgard. Tell me what happened."

"Hm. Very well." Despite his grudging tone, Loki was pleased by the invitation to share his story. He was like a kettle boiling over with thoughts and feelings restless to escape, to be expressed.

"Asgard kept its peace over the Nine Realms only with the aid of the Bifrost; all of Asgard's armies were nothing to the threat that they could appear in your backyard at a moment's notice. When Thor smashed the Bifrost, little wars and insurgencies broke out all over the Nine Realms. But once the Tesseract had returned to them, they were able to re-open the Bifrost and re-establish the peace. By which I mean, of course, smashing everyone else's heads together until they behaved. Neither Odin nor Thor are really much for subtlety.

"Malekith, on the other hand, was. Asgard had been taking prisoners left and right in their efforts to break the insurrections. Malekith snuck an entire regiment of his best warriors into the very heart of Asgard itself by the simple expedient of disguising them as insurgents and sending them to be captured. Once there, they were able to stage a prison break and bring down the defenses that surrounded Asgard. Taken completely by surprise, the Aesir were overwhelmed and pushed back to the palace. They were able to raise the palace shields, and so hold for a little while against Malekith's assault, but his power seemed without limit."

Loki began to pace the office, his inner agitation seeking an outlet. He was becoming more engrossed in his story, now that he was recalling something he had seen rather than recounting what he had learned secondhand after the fact. "There is an... artifact, of sorts, that was created by the Dark Elves. They call it the Aether; other words for it are the Deepness, or the Twilight." Images flitted across his mind, of a deep red substance that crawled through the air like blood under water, reaching and grasping and creeping smoke-like through the tiniest of crevices. "It was created with the intention of quenching all light in the universe, returning the cosmos to the primeval darkness that existed before the birth of the stars. They had tried to do so once before, thousands of years ago, during the kingship of Odin's father Bor. They defeated Malekith, scattered his armies, and the Deepness was said to be destroyed."

"And was it?" It was a rhetorical question, since obviously Thor would not have needed to call Loki back to fight an enemy that had been dead for thousands of years.

"That would have been the _sensible_ thing to do, would it not?" Loki's voice was rich with disgust. "But no. I suppose Bor couldn't pass up the opportunity to have such potent magic under his own control. One never knows when one will want to blot out all light in the sky of an enemy planet, after all.

"He hid it away in the weapons vault of Asgard and told all that it had been destroyed. But it was not. It was bound and dormant but the thing about magical artifacts such as these is that they have a life, an awareness of its own. When Malekith awoke from his slumber, he called to the Deepness and it answered him."

"So he laid siege to Asgard," Charles said.

"Yes. It was the _stupidest_ thing," Loki shook his head, aggravated by the persistent idiocy of his kinsmen. "Bor probably didn't know better, but I don't know what Odin thought he was... The Deepness, you see, was created as the antithesis of light. It would never have the power to extinguish _all_ sources of light in the universe. So instead it was made to _absorb_ all forms of energy - including light - and convert it into its own dark form of energy that allowed it to expand and grow. And that fool Bor had _placed it within his own weapons vault._ With all the other spoils of his conquest, weapons and trophies of unimaginable power.

"No wonder Asgard was unable to repel Malekith's assault. He was being powered by energy siphoned from under their very feet! It even drew power from the Odinforce, forcing the All-Father into an untimely sleep. And the longer it sat down there, soaking up the power Asgard like a sponge, the stronger Malekith became..." Despite the flippant exasperation of his tone, there was still a lingering horror that accompanied the memories; trapped inside the palace inside a glowing golden shell with enemies on all side, pressing eagerly inwards, and a malevolent force growing under their very feet: the Deepness, a corruption of darkness that grew unchecked, devouring all it touched to feed its own unholy growth.

"How long did it take you to find all this out?" Charles prompted him, moving him past the memory of trapped helplessness.

"I _suspected_ what was going on before I ever set foot in Asgard," Loki corrected him. "Confirming it took only as long as it took to argue those paranoid fools into giving me access the vault to check. But that still left the problem with what to _do_ about it. We could not destroy the Deepness, and there was nowhere within Asgard we could take it that it would be out of range of the other sources of power. How fortunate for Thor, that he had within his walls one who knew all the secret boughs and crannies of Yggdrasil.

"Thor and I went alone, with only Sif to accompany us; we could not strip the palace of any more defenders than that. Of course, as soon as the Deepness left Asgard, Malekith sensed it and came to follow, as I knew he would. He intercepted us on Svartalfheim, and he and his golem overpowered Thor to steal the cask and absorb the Deepness into himself."

"Hmm." Charles considered the sequence of memories that played out in Loki's mind. "Of course, I suppose it helped them in this task more than a bit when you stabbed Thor with a paralyzing venom, pushed him down a cliff and kicked him in the face before presenting the casket containing the artifact to Malekith, promising him your allegiance in return for destroying Asgard while you watched."

"Well, yes," Loki admitted, sounding simultaneously embarrassed and smug. "It was all a show of course! But how could I resist? I mean, people were just _lining up_ on Asgard to promise me all sorts of horrible deaths if I betrayed Thor. I simply couldn't bear to disappoint them."

"Very obliging of you," Charles let out a small laugh.

"And it did convince Malekith of my good intentions. Or bad intentions, as the case may be. He never stopped to wonder that I might have tampered with the artifact in any way. Remarkably trusting, for a dark elf.

"And so he took the Deepness into himself, just as he planned. Unfortunately for _him_ , that turned the problem into one that Thor could solve by hitting it hard enough with Mjolnir, just as _he_ planned. Since the paralyzing venom was so handily out of his system by then," Loki concluded with satisfaction. "The backlash from the death of the Deepness set up a singularity that consumed Svartalfheim, but there was little enough of it left by then to wreck, so its destruction was no great loss to the Realms. Just as _I_ planned."

"That's marvelous, Loki," Charles said warmly. "You saved your brother and your friends, and all of the Realms, from what it sounds like. I'm so proud of you." He smiled wryly, then shook his head. "But Loki, you really need to get out of the habit of destroying planets as solutions to your problems."

"I suppose." _Strange mortals and their strange priorities._ "Malekith and his kind sought to purge the universe of light, killing every being that depended on it; the destruction of his homeworld was little enough to pay, for that presumption."

Charles decided not to pursue the point just then. "And then you... 'died?' "

"Yes. It seemed... appropriate. I mean there could hardly be a better location for it, there in the middle of a barren wasteland. And the planet collapsed right after, which conveniently excused the lack of a corpse. I wonder... I wonder if they still had a funeral for me, on Asgard." Images flickered quickly through his mind of an elegant boat gliding gracefully across the dark, the bright arc of a flaming arrow to set it alight. _The longship is for the honored dead. Had I done enough to overcome my dishonor? Thor seemed to think so._ "...Thor leaked all over my face, you know, when he thought I lay dying. Sentimental fool." Those last few words came out sounding almost fond.

"He still loves you."

"He's still a fool," Loki snapped. _More a fool for still loving me. He does, I don't understand it, but he really does. How can he still care for me after everything?_ The thought left him with a warm glow in the pit of his stomach, like the banked remains of a campfire hidden under a careful, protective layer of ashes. "I don't care. I needed... I needed some time to get away. From him. From Asgard. From ( _Odin_ ) from everything. I hid myself from Heimdall, from Hlidskjalf. I don't want him to come looking for me."

"You can stay here as long as you need, Loki," Charles offered. "I'm simply happy to have you here, and see that you are well."

"Odin wasn't," Loki said abruptly. "He didn't care. I brought him the news myself, disguised as a guard. He didn't care. I suppose without Frigga to make him at least pretend to have some semblance of regard for the wretched lost creature he stole from Jotunheim..." He trailed off. _I suppose I truly am an orphan now. Killed my own father Laufey, and now Frigga..._

"Frigga?" Charles asked quietly. "Your mother?"

"Dead." The word was quiet and uninflected, but the storm of rage and grief that followed on it was not. _Dead. Murdered, slaughtered like a beast. Kurzed killed her, he broke her neck like she was nothing, just one more common palace guard for him to cut his way through. He should never have laid hands on her, he should have been struck down from the heavens the moment he tried -_

"I killed him," Loki said, his breathing harsh through his clenched teeth. Air whistled as he drew in a ragged breath. "The monster who killed her - I killed him. I swore I would kill him and then I did. I stabbed him and crushed him and I scattered his ashes in the barren desert. I _killed him,_ and it doesn't... it didn't _help,_ it didn't bring her back. I killed him and _she's still gone."_

_She's gone and I could not stay. I could not stay in Asgard, not with every curtain and carpet bearing the trace of her hand. Not seeing her form in every hallway, her face in every surface. I couldn't do it. So I fled, like a coward. And I came to you because you were the only place I could think in the nine realms that might welcome me._

"I am so sorry, Loki," Charles said, as gently as he could. Images of Frigga fell through his mind, each one colored by pain or grief but still vivid in their beauty and strength. They were without question idealizations, filtered through his memories like this, but the personality of the woman she had been came through sharply nonetheless. "She must have been a remarkable woman."

Loki let out his breath sharply, then turned abruptly to face him. "Give me something to do," he said, his sharp and demanding voice a cover for the raw pain beneath it. _Please._ "Some quest, some task to accomplish, something to keep my mind and my hands busy. I came here to repay my debt to you, to return your boon. Give me a way to repay it!"

"I'm sure I can think of something," Charles said, and then smiled. "Indeed, there are so many possibilities, it's hard to know where to start. What would you think of guest lecturing?"

* * *

Loki was escorted to his new quarters by a mortal woman - no, a mutant woman; he was beginning to be able to tell the difference if he concentrated hard enough - with long red hair and cool grey eyes. She reminded him a bit of the other red-haired woman he had recently encountered, the Lady Spider, and not only because of her hair; they had similar auras of danger about them, a shadow under their eyes that warned others that they had come through many dark battlefields and would not be averse to one more. The look she gave him was wary, despite her demeanor of professional politeness, and Loki was not sure how to feel about that; pleased, perhaps, that even in this place they still recognized the threat he could bring to bear. Perhaps.

"These are the supplementary teacher's quarters," she told him, swiping a blank square wafer in front of a glass panel. The panel beeped, and a loud clack inside the gate indicated that a lock had fallen open; she pulled open the gate and gestured him inside. They were in a small courtyard shaded by trees, with a smooth stone path branching out to each side. The woman (Xavier had said her name, but Loki had not been paying attention terribly well - Gray?) led him to the leftmost corner. The door was made of dark wood, set with wrought iron numbers in Midgardian script that matched the gate. "You'll be in here."

She handed him the wafer and a small set of clinking metal tokens - keys, Loki realized after a brief inspection. "I assume you won't be needing any parking," she said. "It should have all the furnishings in place, but if there's anything you need, you can call Housekeeping - the number is posted on the door. If you need anything else - I understand you're not from around here -"

"I'm sure I can figure things out from here," Loki assured her with a thin smile. These accommodations were simple, compared to Asgard's level of technology, but Loki was not Tho - not an _idiot_. He could make a fair guess at the purpose of any of Midgard's machines; and starting from the premise that a thing was made to be used, it was not usually difficult to figure out how to use it. He had always been skilled at observing those around him and mimicking their behavior... and for anything that really stumped him, there was always magic. "Thank you."

She shot him a doubtful look, but did not pursue the question. "Today is Friday, and Professor X said you would be giving lectures starting Monday," she said in her soft voice. She used the nickname that all the mutants seemed to for Charles Xavier, simultaneously respectful and affectionate. "Hopefully that will be enough time for you to put together a lesson plan. We'll see you then."

With that she turned and walked off, and the faint aura of crackling danger faded with her. Loki waited till she was out of sight before turning to the door she had singled out as his; he dropped the keys into a handy dimensional pocket and simply opened the lock with a twist of his hand in the air, letting himself into what would be his new home.

The small suite of rooms beyond was furnished adequately, if not luxuriously; there was a bed, a chest of drawers and a mirror in one cozy niche, a writing desk and several chairs gathered around a table on the other side of the room. To the right, a bare gleaming tiled floor was bracketed by counters cluttered by unfamiliar metal and plastic devices - he glimpsed what looked like a sink and an oven, so probably a Midgardian kitchen. The walls were divided into two, top and bottom: dark wooden paneling from the waist down, and a soft beige color above. A few metal-framed paintings of landscapes or still life decorated the empty spaces along the walls, tasteful but impersonal. Glass bulbs attached to poles or recessed into the walls and ceiling promised light, as soon as he could figure out to activate them. Short shadowed hallways opening into the walls most likely led to the baths or perhaps weapons storage.

Loki had plenty of battle and adventuring experience and was no stranger to camping out in the wilderness if need be. This was by far a step up from tents pitched on beds of dry heather in the pouring rain, even if it was undoubtedly missing a few amenities Asgardians tended to take for granted. It was... cozy.

And yet -

And yet so sterile, bland and impersonal; it was clearly a _guest_ room, like one you would find at an inn, and there was a difference between taking shelter at an inn for a few nights and _living_ there, making it the closest thing you had to a home.

A sudden impulse took Loki and he murmured a low incantation, raising his hand as the space around him wavered and then expanded in a bubble. The dim room disappeared, washed away in a rising tide as his own chambers in Asgard took their place. The vaulted ceilings, gables carved and gilded, with wide arches opening onto the spectacular view of Asgard beyond. The golden walls veiled behind a multitude of dark velvet drapes and tapestries, offering his eyes some rest from the unrelenting shine of the rest of the palace. The furniture, huge and heavy and carven with runes to make them last; he'd had one desk over two thousand years old still as sound as the day it was made.

Loki built up the illusion inch by inch, detail by detail. Not his rooms as he had last seen them, barely glimpsed during the few hours he'd spent on Asgard before they'd had to hurry the Deepness out of the palace to safety. (Sometime in Loki's absence his rooms had been cleaned to the bone and shut away, like a tomb - all the normal detritus of living that he'd left scattered behind him on the day of his fall had vanished, only a few mementoes kept out on walls and tabletops like museum exhibits.)

No, this was his chambers as they had _once been,_ years ago when he'd still lived in Asgard and everything had been fine. Well. As fine as they had ever been. When he'd still believed himself a prince, still believed himself a _man,_ still thought himself brother of Thor and son of Odin. When his clothing had lain flung over bedposts and strewn across counters in the flurry of getting ready for a feast or ceremony; when a plate of bones and cracker crumbs had sat on the corner of his worktable, the remains of a midnight snack from where he'd worked long nights to perfect new spells. When the trophy bilgesnipe horns that Thor had awarded him after their first hunt hung upon the walls, where Thor would see it every time he came in the door but Loki wouldn't have to look at it the rest of the time. When the first dagger that Odin had ever given him lay stowed in a careful place of honor in his top drawer. When his bed had been graced with quilts given to him as name-day gifts, personally crafted for him by Frigga -

The illusion abruptly collapsed, disappearing as quickly as a popped bubble. Loki's hands clenched into fists to stop them from shaking, set his jaw to stop it from chattering. _An illusion, that's all it ever was,_ he told himself ruthlessly. _The only thing in that world was real was_ _ **her**_ _love, and that's gone now past all remaking._

Standing there in the shadowed and cold foyer of his new home, Loki felt a sudden burst of misery sweep over him. How had he come to this - how had he fallen so far? He had once been a prince of the royal house of Odin, premiere of all the Nine Realms - he had once ridden at the head of a conquering army, poised to destroy all it swept across. How had he descended here to hide in his tiny, cramped little room to serve at the beck and call of _mortals?_

 _But they aren't really mortals,_ he reminded himself, for the mutants were something more, something special and powerful. They were more akin to the Aesir than to the humans who surrounded him, and anyway he was not to be a _servant_ \- he had been invited here to share his knowledge and his power, imparting to them the service of his wisdom.

He owed Xavier a debt, after all. Conquering army or no, he had never been any more than a hapless puppet. During his sojourn in the deep reaches of space, Thanos the Mad Titan had imposed upon him to regain the Tesseract for his own nefarious purposes, then placed a block on his memory to prevent him from recalling enough to resist it. He had stumbled about on Midgard in a daze of confused and half-forgotten schemes, not even realizing that he served not his own fate but the whim of another. If Xavier had not been able to break the block on his mind and recall him to his true self, it was likely that Loki now would be languishing in the dungeons of Asgard, still spinning himself deluded fantasies about a kingship he had never truly wanted in the first place.

And he would repay that debt. If not to Xavier directly, then by proxy to these mutant children he sheltered. He could offer them something that no one else on this benighted planet had. He could be valuable; he could be _valued._

The thought lifted his spirits somewhat. Loki lit the lamps in his new home with a snap of power from his fingertips, and went to investigate the quaint features of his new kitchen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer:
> 
> Although this fic is by its nature a crossover between Avengers and X-men, I feel that I should stress from the get-go that **this is still primarily a story about Loki** (and Xavier.) Most of the well-known, adult X-men will not appear at all. There are a number of reasons for this: I don't know most of the X-men well; I'm not very good at juggling very large casts of characters; and what I do know of the X-men makes it clear that most of them are damaged enough that they tend to throw off a lot of sparks when difficult personalities cross. So to repeat: this is still meant to be a story about Loki, how he is recovering and growing and adapting to his new surroundings. It is not a story about the X-men. For that reason this fic will focus much more on the _schooling_ side of Xavier's School for Mutants, the school and "haven for castaway mutants" side, rather than the "superhero breeding ground" side. 
> 
> I would not be averse to reader suggestions about mutant students who could turn up over the course of the story, but I will only consider them in light of how meeting them would contribute to the arc of the story. So suggestions such as "What if Loki met Wanda? They're both magic users so they'd have a reason to spend time together" would be considered, but "Loki should meet Wolverine, they would hate each other SO much, they would fight and it would be awesome!" or "Gambit is going to show up right! HE'S MY FAVORITE!" would probably be passed over.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki teaches his first class, meets some of the staff, and has a hard conversation with Xavier.

Despite the Gray woman's suggestions, Loki did not arm himself with a 'lesson plan' before he entered the teaching hall on Monday. In point of fact, he had no plan at all. He rarely did; he usually found that his best performances came when he improvised rather than scripted.

The hall he had been assigned to was large, though not so grand as a similar chamber would be on Asgard, and arranged in a semi-circular pattern. Rows of chairs sat in risers that curved around half the room, offering an unobstructed view of the platform at the center. There was a table at the platform's center, and the wall behind it displayed a blank sheet of plastic where an image could be projected. Loki gave it a glance before dismissing it; it was far too flat and constrained for his needs.

The students were here already, a crowd of mortal (no, _mutant_ ) children filling most of the seats. He saw a variety of ages, from a few little ones only just entering the awkward throes of adolescence, to a few tall students in the back who had already achieved their full height, if not yet the flesh to fill out their still-gawky frames.

And there was yet more variety to be seen than of age. Most of the students looked human enough, with a variety of skin and hair colors that ranged from black to fiery red, but there were a few who stood out. One boy sitting down by the end of the row had pale green skin and dark green hair, almost like fur. Another girl had hair in stripes of rainbow color, that he at first assumed was the result of cosmetics until he noticed how the colors shifted when she turned her head. Another boy, deep in conversation with his compatriot, seemed perfectly normal until he laughed - and a long green tubular tongue whipped out briefly before disappearing back into his mouth.

The hum of chatter and clamor of movement died down somewhat when Loki walked into the arena and took the center stage, hands clasped behind him, shoulders thrown back and legs spread for balance. There was not complete silence, though, as there should have been - a few girls continued to whisper to one another, and a few other students continued to be absorbed in their small handheld devices. (Xavier had assured him that camera phones were not permitted on the campus, which was the first Loki even heard they had such things.)

Well. So these would-be champions of Midgard found their game of Angry Birds more interesting than his person? Loki felt his lips curl up in a smile. He could correct that, he was certain.

He brought his arms around him, and his plain Earth suit shimmered and vanished, to be replaced with a set of Asgardian leathers. It was not his full formal war gear, like he had worn to the battle of New York - this was a simpler, plainer set, more like the ones he had carried on his back during that fateful trip to Jotunheim. Plain as they were, they would be plenty exotic enough to these childrens' untested eye, and set the stage for what he as about to say.

"I am Loki," he announced," his voice carrying loud and sudden into every corner of the theater, "son of Odin, King of Asgard and Father of All. For thousands of years Asgard has watched over the Nine Realms, keeping the peace amongst them and protecting them from dangers that threaten from outside.

"As foremost among the Realms, Asgard is the height of prosperity and civilization, burdened with the the honor and the duty to defend its peoples against the savages who would threaten all that is order in the worlds: the trolls, the Sons of Muspel, the Dark Elves, the Frost Giants.

Loki reached the end of his patrol and fetched up at the center of the platform once again, raising his chin with a bitter jerk. His voice took on a brittle tone, not entirely feigned for effect. "So I'm sure you can imagine my _surprise_ when I discovered how very wrong I was. I was _not_ a son of Odin, I was _not_ a prince of Asgard; what I was, what I _am_ instead is one of the very monsters that I was taught all my life to fear and despise."

As he spoke, he called his Jotun skin to him, summoning the sensation of cold as he had learned to do during his sojourn on Svartalfheim. He felt it creeping up through his veins like poison, ridges pressing through his skin against his clothes; he registered the shock and awe on the face of his students as the deep blue color overtook his face, turning his eyes a deep blood red.

"It was quite the shock, let me tell you," Loki told them sardonically, smiling thinly with Jotun-black lips. _See, I am much the same as you,_ he thought. _I too have known the shock of betrayal of self, the pain of being cast out of home and family, of having nowhere to belong._

"I did not... take the surprise well. And my family did not take well my not taking it well." And wasn't _that_ just the understatement of the millenium. "And so I left the Realm Eternal, and came here at the behest of Charles Xavier, to share with you the knowledge of the cosmos that you so shamefully lack."

_And, like you, I came here to start again._

He had captured their attention now, without exception; he could feel the weight of their gazes on him, impressed and attentive. He could _feel_ their regard, in a way he hadn't felt from a crowd of strangers ever before, not even from the terrified crowd of humans in Stuttgart. There, the hapless mortals had wanted nothing more to get away from him. Here, the children looked at him with expectation, like they wanted... _more._

More of _him._

He turned away, releasing the enchantment of cold and feeling his skin wash Aesir-pale in the glow of warmth as he drank in their attention, their regard. "Your world, Midgard, is the newest of the Nine, and your people are also the youngest," he said. "In the days of your people's youth we had much traffick with your world and your people, and many of our dealings with your ancestors have ascended to the status of myth and legend. But I hear that time has worn away at your memory of such days, and that most of your people have become preoccupied with the doings of your own realms and forgotten the lands and peoples which lie outside them.

"The day is fast approaching when you can no longer isolate yourselves. You are here, all of you, because you have been chosen: as the future of your race, yours will be the honor and the duty of representing your world amongst the stars," he said. Charles Xavier had been quite insistent on that point; not only did he wish to prepare his students for all that they might encounter in the universe beyond their little planet, he also wanted to instill in them a sense of solidarity with the ordinary humans who shared that planet. "For that duty you must be prepared, and we will start today, with a reminder of the truths of the greater world of which you are a part.

"This is Midgard as you know it," Loki said, and with a gesture in the air before him a spinning ball of green and blue crystallized to hang in mid-air. He traced his finger in an arc over and around the ball, and a smaller red globe appeared to match it, then a larger golden one. They fell into obedient orbits around the small, brilliant sun, trundling around in their eternal paths. "And its attendant satellites. This world is all the world you know, but it is not all of the worlds that are. See how the rings of Midgard are like the rings of a tree? It is no accident that they should be so - "

He rotated the image flat, so that the worlds rolled around horizontally like marbles on a table. Then he moved his hands carefully apart, one lower and the other higher, and a great blue latticework of light followed his fingertips. Below the orb of Midgard the light spread downwards in a tangle of roots that wove around the table and dug their way into the floor; above it, the thick pillar of the tree-trunk shone with a silvery-blue light as it climbed towards the ceiling above, blooming into a fractalline profusion of limbs and twigs all shining with starlight. Cradled in its boughs, here and there, rested eight new globes of light.

When next he spoke, his voice was almost reverent. "Look well - here is Yggdrasil, the Great Tree of Life, whose roots drink the nutriment of the universe and whose boughs and branches flower with creation. I hope you are taking notes, by the way," he added abruptly, "since there _will_ be a test on this later."

That produced a sudden flurry of consternation in his spellbound audience, and a mass scrambling for stylus and paper. " _Nutriment... of all... creation,"_ he heard one girl whisper as she wrote furiously in her notebook.

Smiling, he returned to his lecture, lighting each Realm as he spoke of it. "Midgard occupies a central place in the Tree. It is the cornerstone, the base on which the rest of the Tree is supported. Without that support, Yggdrasil would collapse, and so your continued well-being is of great interest to those who would protect the Realms, and its control is of even greater interest to those who would own them.

"Midgard also lies as a buffer between the great elemental planes of fire and ice: Muspelheim, to the south, and Niflheim, to the north. It is the balance between the hot death that is chaos and the cold death that is stasis that makes all life possible..."

* * *

Loki's lecture lasted for ninety minutes, and he took a smug satisfaction in knowing that his students were enthralled for every second of it.

He lingered in the lecture hall after the students had all thundered out, laughing and chattering excitedly to one another, somewhat surprised by how _tired_ he felt. True, he had been spellcasting nearly constantly for the last hour and a half, but illusions were his specialty and should not have drained him nearly this much.

 _Drained_ was the better word, perhaps; it had been a long time since he'd been faced with an audience this... receptive. They'd taken everything he had to give them and still looked for more, and although Loki was hundreds of years old and had all the knowledge of the Nine Realms to pass on (and no compunctions whatsoever about keeping any of Asgard's secrets,) he felt a sudden momentary panic about what he was going to _do_ to keep his classes interesting.

Loki left the lecture hall at last, walking along the sidewalk beneath the trees with crisp orange and yellow leaves curling underfoot. He was vaguely torn between heading back to his apartment to rest (to _rest,_ not to hide) or to seek out the commissary he'd heard the other staff members describe. Loki could cook his own food - years of accompanying Thor and his friends on quests had made it something of a necessary skill to learn - but he didn't necessarily like doing it _all_ the time.

Before he got very far towards either of his goals, however, he was approached by a pair of dark silhouettes; one short and wide, though the bulk was more of muscle than of fat, one tall and shaped with slim curves. He eyed the pair of them with misgivings as they approached and their features became more clear; the woman had dark brown skin and a shock of white hair, a combination that put him somewhat unsettlingly in mind of the _dokkalfar_ he had but recently fought, and the man was... _blue._

Not just blue-skinned, he realized as he fought back the first initial surge of disgust and panic; he actually seemed to be covered with a dark blue fur all over his body (or at least the parts of it that were visible under his rumpled suit - hands and feet, throat and face.) Longer hair of a darker navy color, nearly black, stood up from his ears in two proud pointed tufts, and sharp white fangs showed over his blue-black lips when he smiled - as he was doing now.

"Mr. Loki?" the blue-furred man queried as they got nearer; his voice was a deep, vaguely pleasant rumble in his barreled chest. "Sorry, the memo wasn't entirely clear - is Loki your first name, or your surname, or...?

"Ah... that's me, yes," Loki said, coming out of his bemused stupor with a slight jolt. His well-practiced manners took over, and he extended his hand to meet the blue-furred man's in the traditional Midgardian greeting. He had black-tipped claws on his hands, as well, and the strangely gentle grip of one who was painfully aware of the need to control their own strength. "Loki it is, Loki of Asgard - or if you would prefer a name in the local style, Loki Liesmith will do, or Silvertongue."

"Silvertongue. Hm. I like the sound of that," the blue-furred man said with a chuckle. He had silver-rimmed bifocals on his face, Loki realized on closer inspection, that matched his cufflinks and tiepins. "I am Dr. Hank McCoy, although you can call me the Beast if you like, all the kids do. I am a biophysicist - I specialize in mutant genetics, although of course, I am interested a great many other fields as well - and I teach some of the science classes for the upperclassmen."

"Pleasure to meet you, Dr. McCoy," Loki said, the greeting rolling smoothly off his lips. He gave a wary look to the second of the duo that had come to meet him, the white-haired woman. "And the lady...?"

"Ororo Munroe, also known as Storm," the woman said, considerably more brusque than her companion. There was a closed, suspicious look on her features that put him on the defensive in turn, and the slight tickle of a scent about her - like ozone, or the air right after a lightning strike - that reminded him of his brother in battle. The association was not a pleasant one. "Active roster member of the X-men."

"Ah, a _superhero,"_ Loki said, a false smile stretching his lips. "Yes, I _do_ know your type."

"You know, I was watching some of your presentation back in the lecture hall," the Beast said, jumping back into the conversation. "Fascinating stuff. Absolutely fascinating. To think that there are these worlds out there, hovering over our heads all this time - and we had no idea! I gather you are something of a scholar, in your own country - you certainly seem to have the inclination. I wanted to say, if you would ever like to meet up some time and chat over coffee, perhaps you could tell me more about the different species on the different worlds, that would be a real treat." He was smiling as he said this, the sharp white teeth making the expression more than a little bit ferocious, but Loki sensed no threat for him - he seemed sincerely in earnest.

Loki bit back the first reaction to come to his lips, which was an automatic refusal to any kind of overture or invitation. The little beast seemed friendly enough; Loki needed to consider making connections in this new world he found himself in. He could not limit his contacts only to Charles Xavier and the students. "I... would look forward to such a meeting," he allowed. "Perhaps not today, but... sometime." He glanced over at Storm. "And what about you, lady of storms? Do you also wish to hear more about the realms above?"

"No, I think I've pretty much had my fill of aliens lately," she replied coolly. "You know, Loki, from what I've heard you have a pretty high opinion of yourself. I hear that you showed up to a crowd in Germany and announced yourself a God."

"Mortals have been mistaking my kind for gods since well before I was born, Ms. Munroe," Loki told her, matching her cool tone. "It's no doing of mine."

"Yes, humans do tend to do that. Nothing good ever comes of it." Her lips compressed into a tight line, as though remembering some ugly incident from her own past.

"Ororo," the Beast said quietly, his voice softly reproachful.

She raised her chin and looked him straight in the eye, her gaze flat and level. "They say you were once a prince in your own land," she said. "I hope you did not come here expecting any kind of special treatment. Professor X may have allowed you to stay here, but I don't want you to get the idea that you're somehow _better_ than any of us."

 _Oh, I don't have to think it. I_ know _it,_ Loki thought, smirking slightly as he generously refrained from saying it aloud. These mutants might be more than mortal men, but they were still less than the Aesir - they might have fragments of godhood, but the least citizen of Asgard had more power than all of them put together.

He, of course, was not a citizen of Asgard.

Nor truly Aesir.

His smile faded as the truth of that sank in. He was Jotun under his cuckoo skin, far too small and weak to even fully earn the status of _Frost Giant._ Well might the mortals brag and boast of their own superiority over one such as him.

For a moment, the beautiful autumn trees seemed to grey out around him, crushed inward by the weight of that truth. Something of it must have shown in his face, despite all his attempts at keeping a calm and polished expression, since the Beast took hold of his companion's elbow in a meaningful way. "Well, we won't keep you," he said in a tone of forced cheeriness. "We really just wanted to say hallo, and congratulate you on your first class. Do look me up some time for lunch, however - I truly would be interested in discussing the comparative taxonomy of different worlds. Ciao!"

With a glare at his companion, he ushered the two of them down the footpath past him, as Loki watched them go in mild bemusement. As they passed him by, he shook his head and turned to continue on his way - definitely back to his room, he thought; he'd already had more than enough _socialization_ for one day.

Once they had passed out of his sight around the corner of the building, the two of them fell to arguing in fierce whispers. Perhaps they were under the impression that he could no longer hear them, possessed of the same incorrect assumptions about his capabilities that Nick Fury and his men had once been.

First the beast-man, low and reproachful. _"Ororo, what were you thinking? Professor X specifically told us to be nice to him!"_

Then the lady's voice, higher and more outraged than her companion's. _"Professor X is far too trusting!"_ she fumed. _"I don't know what he was thinking, bringing in a supervillain to teach guest lectures!"_

 _"He's not a villain - not any more,"_ Beast reminded her softly.

_"Well, he's certainly not a hero!"_

Loki snorted. _You have that right, dear lady,_ he thought. And must he always be one or the other?

She continued on her outraged rant. _"He doesn't belong in a classroom! Who knows what kind of dangerous things he might try to fill their heads with? He's a killer and a criminal, and I don't want him around the kids!"_

A sigh from the Beast. _"He's not the only one with a criminal past who's come here to start over, you know."_

Storm snorted in disdain. _"Getting in a shootout with the police or torching an old building is one thing - bringing in an alien army to trash New York City is quite another!"_

 _"All right, all right!"_ Beast realized he had let his voice get too loud, and dropped it again. _"He's done a lot of harm, I don't deny that. But don't you realize how much potential for good he has in him? If he's truly changed his ways, the knowledge he brings could revolutionize science as we know it."_

"If _he's changed his ways,"_ Storm said darkly. _"The leopard does not truly change his spots, nor the scorpion his sting."_

 _"Professor X would know his mind better than you or I, Ororo,"_ Beast said warningly. _"It's his call to make, and I respect his judgment. Don't you?"_

 _"Of course I do!"_ The response came quick and unthinking, and then a brief pause fell as she realized she'd been outmaneuvered. She muttered, _"But I'm still going to keep an eye on him, that's all."_

 _"If you say so..."_ Footsteps followed, and their voices dropped to an inaudible level at last as they passed out of his hearing range. Loki rubbed his hand over his face, then sighed.

So, Xavier's little commune was not quite as in accord as he would have wished it. Not surprising, really - in a way, it was almost good to have the other shoe drop. He couldn't even resent her for her distrust, however little he personally liked her - they were not without basis, after all. And he couldn't help but admire her fierce devotion to Charles Xavier, and her protectiveness over the children in her care. Storm's threats did not particularly alarm him, nor her distrust perturb him; in a weird way, it almost made him nostalgic for life back on Asgard.

Asgard, where he had never truly belonged.

Loki continued back towards his apartment, but the bounce had gone from his step.

* * *

Earlier in the day, Charles had invited Loki to come by his office after dinner, should he wish to talk. He made it an invitation rather than a demand, but he was fairly confident that Loki would come; dropped into a completely new environment, however welcoming it tried to make itself to him, would naturally leave him lonely and lead him to seek out familiar company.

Sure enough, shortly after the clock struck nine, Charles felt the approaching cloud of Loki's mood outside his door. He was a strange and contradictory mix of self-satisfied and pensive; there was an underlying greyness to his thoughts that belied the brighter flashes of triumph and pleasure that overlaid them. Charles called for him to come in, and indicated he should make himself comofrtable.

"So, Loki," Charles said, turning a smile on the alien as he settled himself gracefully on one of the heavy antique armchairs in his often. "I hear that your first class was quite a hit with the students. You're quite the natural!"

Loki smirked, preening under the praise, and Charles let him wallow in it for a little while. What Loki needed was not humbling - he had had far too much of that in his life - but rather, to build up pride in the right things, in building and creating instead of destroying. "Yes, well," he said. "They know so little of the universe beyond this world, it was as but a drop in the bucket. They attended well, I must say."

"I heard bits and pieces of it from others, but not the whole thing," Charles said. He had also watched a few minutes of the presentation on the tape recording that was going at all times in the lecture hall; he hadn't mentioned that part to Loki as he didn't want him to think that he, specifically, was being monitored. It was simply part of the security in place all over the estate. "Do you think you would be willing to give me the cliffs-notes versions?"

Loki smiled. "The teacher becomes the student?" he asked, clearly amused.

"Well, I can't let the children get ahead of me, now can I? What would it look like, if the headmaster of the school knew less about a topic than the youngest students?" Charles joked in return.

The first time he had met Loki, the demigod had been in far too much distress - both physical and mental - to see the humor in much of anything. Despite that, Charles had very early on sensed a deep streak of humor and mischief in it, and tailored his teaching approach accordingly. He figured that Loki would respond better to jokes and gentle teasing - as long as it was not too much at his own expense - than to stern sentorious lectures. And, as Loki's personality had gradually emerged from the hostile defensive shell he'd built for himself, he had proven Charles right.

"Well, we can't have that, now can we?" Loki said. "Very well." He raised his hands and conjured up a small diagram of blue light before him, a much smaller and more abstracted version of the Tree that he had shown in the lecture hall. "These are the Nine Realms as they are found on Yggdrasil, the Great Tree - which is a poetic way of saying a bloom of magical ley-lines that connect a number of regions of space to one another, allowing for nearly effortless communication and transportation. Starting from the top we have Asgard, Vanaheim, Alfheim..."

Charles nodded and paid serious attention, taking mental notes as he went (he was quite serious that a knowledge of the larger planetary-political situation was something he could not afford to lack,) but he was studying Loki as much as he studied the diagram, watching his shifting thoughts and feelings as he reeled off the listing of the Nine Realms. Waiting for one in particular.

When Loki paused for breath, having completed his summary but before launching into a more detailed synopsis of each one, Charles broke in with a question. "So, from what you've told me, it sounds like there are actually considerably more than nine planets that make up Yggdrasil," he said.

Loki nodded. "Yes, there are many more, but most of them are quite uninteresting - like the barren ones in your own solar system," he said. " 'Midgard' technically refers to all of them, but Earth is really the only part that anyone cares about."

"Then what differentiates a named Realm from an empty planet?" Charles asked artfully.

"The difference is that there is someone there to name it," Loki replied, absently calling up the image of one planet after another. "A world with no sentient life upon it is just a barren rock."

"I see," Charles said. "So the Nine Realms are so called because they are all of the worlds that are inhabited by people?"

"Yes, precisely," Loki confirmed.

"Well, then, doesn't that necessarily mean that the Frost Giants are people?" Charles said.

Silence reigned in the room. Charles felt the chilling of Loki's thoughts as almost a physical sensation, and prodded further at the point. "Or at least, that the ones who drew your maps and ordered the Nine Realms thought so?"

Loki said nothing, but then he didn't need to; Charles could read his reaction as easily as if he'd shouted it. He went on, "From what you've said of their history, they were able to fight in a full-scale campaign against the Aesir. It doesn't seem like they'd have been able to coordinate that without a pretty high degree of awareness."

"They have a certain base cunning," Loki admitted begrudgingly. "Nothing more."

Charles shook his head. "Loki, in my experience, the word 'cunning' is used by people who know very well that the one they're talking about is very smart indeed, but they want to make it sound like a bad thing," he said. " _Men_ are smart, but only _beasts_ are cunning."

Loki scoffed. "Beasts or men, what difference does it make to you?" he demanded.

Charles leaned forward, dropping the levity as he gazed steadily at Loki, forcing him to meet his eyes. "It makes a difference, Loki, because there is a very great difference between trying to destroy monsters, and attempting to wipe out a race of people," he said forcefully. "When you talked about the Frost Giants back on the Helicarrier, you called it 'pest control.' Do you really believe that?"

Loki bristled defensively. "There is no shame in destroying your enemies - and folly to leave an enemy alive behind you to rise against you once more," he snapped. "Your own history is rife with examples."

He shook his head seriously. "Perhaps at one time, Loki, and perhaps on Asgard," he said. _And today, according to many people who believe that mutants should be wiped out._ "But on Earth - at least among all enlightened civilizations - we have come to realize that genocide is always wrong. Why do you suppose that is?"

"Because you mortals are fool-headed and soft-hearted?" Loki said drily.

Charles let himself smile, but it quickly faded. "I was thinking more that we have a moral obligation to recognize the value of life. _All_ life."

Loki looked away, and Charles could almost hear him shifting tactics. "It's not about morality. It's just necessity," he argued. "Odin's father Bor exterminated the entire race of Dark Elves to end of the war with Svartalfheim, and he was exalted for it. It is not evil to destroy what is bad, to protect what is good. And sometimes there is no other choice."

"Maybe," Charles said. "But Loki, there is a distinct difference between destroying someone for what they have done - or what they will do - and destroying them simply for what they _are._ The first is a hard choice that we sometimes must make, but the second is only seeking an excuse.

"Tell me, Loki: after the Frost Giants were defeated by Asgard, did they continue to make war on the Nine Realms?"

"No," Loki admitted. _They could hardly have done so, after all, deprived of the Casket._

"And if you and Thor had not stirred up their court, do you think they would have attacked Asgard again?"

"Maybe," Loki hedged. _No._ He added rebelliously, "Laufey certainly jumped at the chance for a little assassination, when it was offered to him -"

Charles continued on relentlessly. "And once you had killed Laufey, killed their king and their impetus for war, do you think there was any reasonable way that the Frost Giants could have continued to press their attack, and lay threat to all of Asgard?"

Loki's eyes dropped to the floor. "...No," he muttered.

"Then you sought to destroy them not because of what they did, but because of what they are," Charles said with a sigh. Loki's expression turned mutinous, but deep inside Charles caught sight of a first - a flicker of shame. _Good,_ Charles thought. Remorse could not be beaten into Loki, not with fists or with harsh accusatory words - such things would only drive him further into resistance. But to know that he was _capable_ of feeling remorse - it was a start.

"What they _are_ is a race of monsters," Loki snarled. "Vicious and cruel, stupid and cowardly. They cannot build or create, only ape the forms of their betters. They have no art nor higher learning, nor even the capacity for such. They go naked like beasts, and live in caves. They are worth _nothing."_

"And yet here you are, Loki," Charles said, "and you are none of those things. So the potential must be in them, however their circumstances have impoverished them."

"But the others are _not_ like me," Loki objected vehemently. "I don't even look like them. A runt, a throwback. Small, scrawny, weak and deformed."

He began pacing the room, driven by the storm of his thoughts. "Perhaps I am a different kind of Frost Giant after all," he mused aloud, his imagination suddenly lit by the idea. "A different race, the same way you mutants are different from humans." He wheeled to face Charles, his face breaking out in a smile. "Perhaps I too am a mutant!" _Just like the others, just like you. Perhaps I truly do belong here?_

Charles sighed. _Well, feelings of belonging are good,_ he thought privately, _but this vicious contempt of the father race is not ideal._ "Loki, of course you belong here," he said aloud. "But I'm not really the best person to be using this argument on, given that I've spent my entire life in the study of how mutants differ from humans, and yet I know from personal and direct experience that their mental processes are pretty much the same."

Loki scoffed, sullenness asserting itself once more. "Who are you to try to educate me on the truth of the Frost Giants, when you have never even set foot off your pitiful world?" he demanded. "You know nothing about Jotunheim."

"And I'm beginning to think that you know nothing about them, either," Charles said sharply. "All you know of them was taught to you by Asgard, and Asgard was at war with the Frost Giants for centuries. It's not uncommon for a nation to demonize and degrade the people they have to fight - even after the fighting is done. It's easier to oppress an enemy if you can convince yourself they deserve no better.

"And of course you would believe that to be true, because you've been fed those lies your whole life."

Loki flinched. It was clear that was a sore point for him; his fall into madness had begun with just such a realization, that all he had been taught since childhood was a lie that had been fed to him by those who he trusted the most in the world - his parents.

"What do you know about the Frost Giants, Loki?" Charles asked, his voice deceptively gentle. "What you _really_ know, not just what you've been told? What have you seen with your own eyes, heard with your own ears?"

Loki turned away, avoiding his eyes, but he could not silence his thoughts. They slipped over one another like shining fish in a school, too quick to grasp, but also too quick to banish. _Frost giants are cruel and wicked. I know_ that _for certain,_ he thought. And beneath that, the terrible doubt that he tried so hard not to let free: _They must be, they_ must _be, because if they aren't - because if they aren't bad if they aren't cruel if they aren't evil, then_ **why am I?**

"Please," Loki said aloud, a catch in his voice that was dangerously near to breaking open. His hands raised unconsciously towards his head, grasping unconsciously at his hair as though he could physically push the thoughts back. "Please, I can't -"

"It's all right, Loki," Charles said, instantly abating the pressure, softening his tone. "I won't force you to do anything, or talk about anything you don't want to."

Loki exhaled and nodded, relief clear in his thoughts. The seething chaos of his thoughts subsided - but the doubts, once entertained, could never be fully banished.

"Why don't we leave things here for the night?" Charles suggested. "For the next few days, I want you to think about my last question. Think about all the things you know about Frost Giants, and try to separate things you've actually observed from things you've merely been told."

Loki managed a smile, though a weak one compared to his usual. "Are you assigning me homework, Professor?" he asked.

"Well," Charles said wryly. "I _am_ your teacher, am I not?"

The smile on Loki's face faded, and he gave Charles a look of strange intensity. "Yes," he said quietly. "You are."

He bid Charles a good night, and left to wrestle with his own thoughts.

* * *

~to be continued...


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki's first week at Xavier's school comes to a close.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I've been quiet lately -- NaNo, as you know, has come and gone, and I was working on another project alongside this one.
> 
> Speaking of which, I normally go along without a beta-reader (as I'm sure readers have noticed from time to time,) but I find myself desperately needing one for this other project I'm working on. Normally I'm content to just let the story come along as it will, but for this particular project I really want to polish it as much as possible before publishing. If any of my readers has beta-reading experience and is interested, please let me know.

Thursday morning found Loki in one of the many small gyms that dotted the campuses, surrounded by a crowd of bleary-eyed adolescents. Xavier had given Loki a very good idea of what sort of students would be attending this class, but it was still a bit of a shock to actually look around and see them - not just students but truly _children,_ young even by the mayfly standards of this realm. The oldest couldn't be more than fourteen, going by how Xavier had described the years that bounded mortal development, and the youngest appeared about nine.

Xavier had explained that most mutants' powers did not manifest until adolescence, so even if Xavier were able to scry their presence using Cerebro at an earlier age than that, there was no need to invite them to the school for the safety of the children and those around them. But occasionally, a mutant appeared whose powers were so strong - or so idiosyncratic - that they began to manifest early.

Loki understood - on an intellectual level, at least - that Midgard nowadays played host to so _many_ mortals that even taking into account the extremely low rate of mutants in the populace, there were hundreds of thousands of them at a time. By contrast, the population of Xavier's School for Gifted Youths topped out at a few hundred permanent residents (with more coming and going seasonally.) Mutant children (or adults) were only brought here by their concerned families when their powers became too much for them to safely handle - or when those families themselves turned on their own children, rejecting them for what they had become. Or did worse than reject them.

Loki tried not to compare his own family history too much to those orphaned mutants. He tried not to read his own loss and anguish in every small face. But he was not always successful. He knew that the relatively small number of mutants at Xavier's school was proof that most mortal parents were not like that - that most parents tried, with varying degrees of success, to cope with their children's sudden differences - but there were still so _many_ that did not.

It was clear by their expressions that they had no idea what they were doing there, and that most of them were not accustomed to being awake at that hour. One side of Loki's lips curled up, as he recalled many sunrises he'd watched from the training grounds of Asgard, clammy with dew. These mortals had no idea, they really didn't.

Loki stepped out, hands clasped behind his back and long coat swinging around him. He wore a much plainer and looser set of clothes today than usual, in dark greens and greys and black with little adornment, more suitable for physical activity than for court (although all of Asgard's fashions are practical for war.) But to eyes accustomed to Midgard fashions, he still looked formal and intimidating, and he knew it.

"Greetings," he said, letting his eyes slide around the room to take in the students there. "I'm sure you're all wondering why you've been called here at this hour. The truth is, today is the day that you will begin your defense training."

The students traded uncertain glances, and one girl in the back slid her hand up to wave in the air tentatively. Loki at first ignored her as he continued with his preplanned speech, prepared to overlook her undisciplined fidgeting; but her hand only waved higher in the air as he spoke, and when he sent her a warning glance she nearly rose on her toes in response. At last it occurred to Loki that she was _trying_ to get his attention, that this was some Midgardian classroom ritual, and with a frown he finished off his speech and pointed in her direction to single her out. "You," he said. "What's your name?"

"Tenko," she said, lowering her hand. She had straight black hair and dark eyes that looked at him fearlessly from under smooth eyelids. "Um, we aren't supposed to be learning to fight yet. The minimum age for starting X-Man training is fourteen, and you have to opt in and pass a bunch of evaluations first to make sure your powers are even useful."

A few murmurs of agreement came from the rest of the crowd of students. Loki's eyebrows rose. "Who said anything about combat training?" he said severely. "This is a _defense_ class."

"But the school is supposed to be safe," another student piped up nervously.

"And it is kept so by the constant efforts of those who have pledged to your service," Loki said ruthlessly. "It is no less your duty to do _your_ part to keep yourselves safe, should enemies slip behind the lines.

"You, all of you, must surely realize that the world is full of those who would harm you - not ones you have made by your actions, but simply because you _are._ If enemies attack you, do they imagine that they will courteously leave you alone just because you are too young? Because you are small and weak?" Loki shook his head, an expression of mock distress on his face.

"Starting today you will learn to defend yourself. I do not seek, at this point, to develop your specific talents in the service of self-defense - that is for other teachers than myself. Instead I will teach you what you _all_ need to know; how to block a blow or free yourself from a hold, how to arm yourself or conceal yourself from unfriendly eyes, how to defend against enemies who are larger and stronger than yourself -"

_"Oh please, like you'd know anything about that."_

Loki broke off, frowning thunderously as he scanned the crowd. "Who said that?" he said, his voice dangerously low. He understood that customs were different in Asgard, that mortal children were accustomed to much greater permissiveness than Loki had ever been, but he would _not_ tolerate disrespect.

The students looked at each other nervously, avoiding Loki's eye. One small boy towards the back, his skin a patchwork of green and pink, swallowed slowly and raised his hand. _"You heard me?"_ the voice came again, more uncertain than before. Loki realized, this time, that the child's mouth had not moved when he spoke, and the realization rocked him back on his heels a bit.

"Excuse me, teacher, but it can't have been Artie," another boy was quick to speak up to defend his classmate. "Artie doesn't _talk."_

"Well, it seems that he just _did,"_ Loki said dryly. It seemed that the boy was a budding telepath, broadcasting his thoughts out around him not unlike what Charles Xavier himself did, albeit on a much weaker scale. Perhaps other mortals were not sensitive enough to pick up on the broadcasts, so this Artie had become used to going unheard. It would be unfair, then, to castigate him for what he did not realize he spoke aloud.

"It seems that Artie is of the opinion that I would know nothing about the art of defending myself against a larger enemy," Loki relayed to the class, voice heavy with sarcasm.

The students looked at each other, then at him.

"Well, _yeah,_ " the male student who had defended Artie had said. "I mean, you're _huge."_

"You won a fistfight with _Captain America,"_ another student added in. "It was on the news."

"You had _your own army!"_ a third girl called from the back.

Loki rocked back on his heels, completely dumbfounded by the idea that _he_ would be considered an imposing figure. True, he was taller than most mortals - though still on the short side for an Aesir - and his armor lent him a certain amount of padded bulk. But still, for his entire life Loki had always been the smaller one, the weaker one, skinny and frail when compared to -

"Well," Loki said, and gave them a thin, sardonic smile. "Appearances can be deceiving. I may look impressive to you now, but in my youth, I looked more like _this."_

He made a pass with his hand, concentrating, and his form shimmered and shrank into the body he remembered with painful familiarity from his adolescent years. Shorter by handspans, and skinny as a beanpole, the cool air feeling miserably cold on his skin. He remembered this body from his one hundred and thirtieth birthday, when Thor had already shot up in his growrth spurt and was thrashing his way enthusiastically through all the trainers Odin could hire for him, and Loki was... not.

The students murmured to each other, their gaze sharpening on Loki with intense interest. "My brother and _his_ friends on the other hand, with whom I was expected to practice combat training every day," Loki said, deciding to drive the point home, "looked more like _this."_

A wave of his hand in the other direction, and an illusion of Thor and his cronies shimmered into being in the center of the gymnasium. Thor in the center, a blond mountain of a man in gleaming armor with Mjolnir in his fist; flanking him were Fandral and Hogun, swaggering in all their war gear. Volstagg loomed behind them, huge enough to frame even Thor's mighty muscle with his imposing bulk, his wild hair and beard making him look even more terrifying.

Perhaps it was a _slight_ exaggeration - Thor was tall even for an Aesir, cresting seven feet, and the Warriors Three were not far behind him, but Loki _might_ have added a few inches here and there to illustrate his point. He also did not include Sif in the group, as her smaller stature and fine-boned features did not on first grasp look so imposing (an ironic twist, since she was actually the best fighter of the lot. Her technique was even better than Thor's; she'd bested him regularly until he'd gained so much sheer muscle mass on her that she could no longer match his brute strength.)

" _This_ was how _I_ learned to fight," he said to the students, who were gaping at the illusion. "And what I learned from them, I will now teach to you."

Lacking anyone else in his weight class to make a suitable demonstration partner, Loki conjured up one of his doubles to be his training dummy. He kept his short and skinny guise, but gave his doppelganger his usual appearance, so that his students could observe how a smaller opponent would act against a larger one. He demonstrated a few basic moves - how to break out of a few holds, one or two of the flashier throws to keep his audience's interest - and then called the students down to the gym floor to spread out and practice the moves on their own.

He set them to do drills; the only way to imprint the moves into their muscle memories was to do them, over and over dozens of time. He and his double walked around the gym, observing his students' (mostly pitiful) first efforts and correcting them when their errors were too egregious to risk memorizing.

His last words lingered in his mind, though, and he brooded over them. Despite what he had told the students, it hadn't been Thor - or his cronies - that has taught Loki the art of defense; that had been a white lie he'd used to smooth over the truth. It had been Frigga.

The truth was that the Asgardian art of defense was not usually taught to men of any age, and certainly not to those who were expected to grow to be warriors - it was too conservative, focusing too heavily on reserve and counterattack instead of the brutal, straight-forward berserker aggression that Asgard favored. Rather, it was the combat style that was most commonly taught to - and by - women. In Asgard, men were always expected to be warriors; it was the women's job to defend the home from any attackers that might breach the defenses. And though it was a less honorable form of combat, it was also considerably more practical and ruthless, for while a man might battle for his honor over an injury or slight, a woman was expected to fight only in the last extremity.

It was impossible to be here, correcting the form of these clumsy girl-children and boy-children, and not remember the days that Frigga spent training him in the garden. When Loki had floundered and struggled at the regimen of combat training that a prince of Asgard was expected to master, it had been Frigga who had stepped in, taken him aside out of sight and taught him the ways of the staff and the dagger. She'd taught him subtlety and sleight, how to recognize the potential in any number of household objects to become a weapon and lift them with light fingers while his enemy's attention was elsewhere. She taught him how to kill from a distance, or quietly in close quarters; she taught him not about strength and honor, but about survival and victory.

Loki had taken to the craft like a duck to water, and he had not only mastered Frigga's style of defense but improved on it; in time, he had been able to translate the defensive skills to offensive ones, and become as feared a warrior on the battlefield as any of his peers. But no matter how many enemies he cut his way through he could never quite shake the stigma of the methods in which he had been taught - every Asgardian who watched him on the battlefield knew in an instant that it didn't matter whether he killed like a man, he still fought like a woman.

And Loki had never been able to escape the mixed feelings of gratitude and shame that filled him whenever he remembered Frigga's training. Because as much as he loved her for giving him this gift of knowledge, these skills that kept him and his brother and his friends alive on the battlefield - he still hated that by doing so, she had marked him apart forever. In the years since their lessons Loki had tried to distance himself from Frigga's tutelage, rather than honoring her as other warriors did their teachers. He had been ashamed of her teachings, ashamed of her - and of himself.

Perhaps at the bottom of it, it was himself he hated, for being so weak as to make it necessary in the first place. He wasn't sure. He didn't want to be sure.

Frigga's gifts, like her love, had always flowed freely and without hesitation. And so he had taken them for granted, disregarding them while he constantly strove towards that which seemed so tantalizingly just out of reach - Odin's approval. Would that he could live those long years over again, and he would return Odin the disregard he so deserved and focus all his attention on Frigga instead of just assuming she would always be there -

Something tugged at his magic, pulling his attention back out of his brooding thoughts of the past. His doppelganger had noticed something out of place, and was calling him to it. Nonchalantly Loki strolled over to that side of the gymnasium, trading places with his double, and eyed the source of the disturbance curiously.

One of the girls, no more than twelve or thirteen and with wavy brown hair, was leaning up against the gymnasium wall with her arms folded across her chest. She was watching the other students practice with an odd wistfulness, but made no move to do the katas herself.

"These exercises are not merely for fun, you know," Loki said, stepping up beside her with a casual ease. She looked up at him with a start, brown eyes widening, and took an involuntary step away. Loki smiled down at her, although he was well aware that it was not an entirely friendly expression. "Nor are they, in fact, optional at all. Have you tired yourself out so quickly, then?"

"Oh, no," the girl said, ducking her head. "It's just - I don't have to do this sort of thing."

"You believe you don't need to know how to defend yourself?" Loki repeated incredulously. "Whyever not?"

"Well - because of my power," the girl said. She raised one hand in a little wave, and her form was suddenly less _there_ to Loki's perception. "I can phase through matter - that's what Professor X calls it. No one can touch me if I don't want them to, so why do I have to worry about learning something I'll never use?"

Loki's eyes widened. That was a potent ability for evading capture and assault, indeed - but Loki could already think of three ways around it. And if he could, then others surely could as well.

More to the point, everyone who was in this class today was here at the request of Charles Xavier. Which meant that Xavier, who had already been aware of this little mutant's ability, had still wanted her to learn what Loki had to teach.

"I see," was all Loki said aloud. "What is your name, miss?"

"Pryde," the girl introduced herself shyly. "Katherine - um, you can call me Kitty, everyone does."

"Well, then, Katherine Pryde," Loki said. He made a subtle gesture with one hand, casting force fields on the walls and floor around them. "That is all very well and good, that you have such a power. But tell me, Miss Pryde, what will you do when they take your powers away from you?"

He took a step closer, into her personal space, looming suddenly above her. Kitty gasped, and moved reflexively to back through the wall and away - only to bounce unexpectedly against Loki's forcefield. She could phase through _matter,_ but the force-shield was not matter at all, and so her power was no use against it.

"Because they will, you know, if they can," Loki said, taking another step forward and crowding her against the wall. She looked up at him, eyes huge and frightened, back and palms pressed against the wall. He bent his head to look down on her, mesmerizing her with his gaze. "They will neutralize your power the first chance they get. Do you not think they are already studying ways to do so? They will find a way, and when they come to get you, you will have nothing... all the walls of the world will be a prison to you, hemming in your escape as they reach for you, and seize you, meaning to drag you away to some hole in the ground that the light will never find."

He took another half-step forward and then crouched, bringing his face down to her level. "They believe that without your power, you are helpless," he said softly. "But they're wrong, aren't they? You aren't helpless. Underestimating you will be their fatal mistake, because you - you have a secret. You are _more_ than just your mutation. And you know how to fight back."

She gulped, her throat bobbing even as she stared fascinated into his eyes.

"Isn't that right," Loki breathed, and she jerked out a nod. Loki smiled, and stood up again.

"That's what I thought," he said, and with another gesture recalled his force fields. "Come, Miss Pryde, and practice with the others. I assure you, your form can't be any more abysmal than theirs."

* * *

The rain had come and gone, leaving the scent of it heavy in the air around the campus. It was an odd sharp mixture of freshness brought down from the clouds, mixed with the organic smell of decay from the stirred-up carpet of fallen leaves and the dirt below it.

Loki sat at a small, shabby table wrought of cast iron and glass, at the corner of a small courtyard of wet flagstones. Dr. Hank McCoy, the Beast, sat on another of the fancy iron chairs across from him, and they were both nursing paper cups - Hank's of dark coffee, steaming gently in the air, Loki's of iced hot chocolate. He'd had a chance to sample all three of the most popular beverages of this kingdom - coffee, tea, and chocolate - in both their hot and cold forms, and he found this one the most palatable. (The much-vaunted _caffeine_ did not seem to affect his physiology, and without it he didn't see much appeal in a bitter drink for its own sake.)

The campus had its own coffee stand, run by a mortal - not mutant - woman who mixed the drinks and called out the orders in a sure voice. He gathered that she was the older sister of one of the boys here, and had taken this job on-campus in order to be close to him while he trained his powers. Loki had accepted Hank's invitation to meet him here between classes - this was now the second morning they had spent over leisurely cooling (or in Loki's case, melting) drinks.

Their first meeting had been stilted and awkward, with Loki stiff and wary of some kind of conversational trap, and Hank not really knowing what to say to a centuries-old extraterrestrial with a severe chip on his shoulder. They had started out on safe topics - the weather, a comparison of hot beverages on both Earth and Asgard (Loki had always been an oddity in his dislike of hot drinks.) Hank did not bring up Storm's behavior from the other day, and Loki did not mention the fact that Xavier had obviously commanded his staff to be kind to their off-world fugitive.

Then they had gotten to talking about some of the students who were common to both of their classes, and from there things had eased; the conversation had moved on to a more general commiseration of the woes of teaching, and then an intellectually fascinating discussion of their respective topics. Eventually they had had to break off that topic as the hour was growing late, but met again on Friday morning after Loki's morning class to resume it. Loki had even gotten bold enough to float the idea that had occurred to him in Xavier's session the other day - that he himself was a mutant strain of Frost Giant, as the mutants were a genetic variant of mortals. Hank had thought the idea fascinating, but did not know enough of the genetic makeup of Frost Giants to know how likely it was.

It was in the midst of this discussion that Loki gradually became aware that they were being watched. He always kept one wary eye out for potential danger in the environment, although so far Xavier's school had been peaceful enough for him to relax his guard somewhat. But he still could not fail to notice the pair of mutants - students? - that were hovering near the perimeter of the cafe, trying _not_ to stare at them too obviously and mostly failing.

The woman at first confused Loki as to her age; her soft brown hair was streaked with white, but her pretty features were unmarked and her face was flushed with the vigor of youth. She was overdressed for this mild fall weather, bundled in furred boots and multiple layers of long-sleeved coats, with gloved fingers peeking out past the ends of the sleeves and a scarf wound around her entire neck until her face was the only exposed part of her skin.

Her companion's age, Loki could not guess at, for he was the strangest sight Loki had set eyes on since he had come to the skin. He had a head of curly black hair, and his skin was so dark an indigo color as to be almost black as well; only in the full sunlight did blue undertones reveal themselves. His eyes were a startling yellow against this dark background, and his hands - also gloved - had only three fingers each. He kept pacing back and forth, turning towards them and then nervously away, while his female companion spoke to him with quiet words of encouragement.

Hank noticed his frown and broke off mid-sentence, turning to follow his gaze. Then his features brightened under their mask of blue fur, and he waved at the distant figures. "Ah, it's two of my favorite students!" he chuckled, and waved them over with an expansive hand. "You know, I've been meaning to introduce you to Kurt. From what I've heard the two of you have quite a bit in common."

Loki stiffened in his seat, and couldn't quite keep the iciness out of his voice as he said, "Do tell."

Hank looked surprised, then faintly apologetic. "I mean that Kurt has quite a mischievous streak in him," he explained. "Some of the others in his age group call him the Trickster, for he likes to play pranks - mostly harmless, thankfully. He can teleport short distances, you see, and so he has a tendency to bring large objects - like the professor's car - into other students' dorm rooms, leaving them with no way to get them out. He also decorated all the rooftop spires with pumpkins for Halloween last year, which was festive enough until they began to rot and fall down around our ears. It was raining pumpkin rinds for a week or so, until we finally got one of the fliers to go up and take them all down."

The two children approached, somewhat hesitantly despite Hank's welcoming gesture. "Hi," the girl introduced herself. She had a soft twang to her words that Loki had not heard from the people of this kingdom before. "I'm Anna Marie, and this is Kurt. We've been hearing a lot about your classes from some of the younger students, Mr. Loki, and we really wanted to get a chance to meet you."

By a certain inflection in her tone, Loki gathered that she meant that her companion really wanted to meet him, and she was mostly here as emotional support. This guess was borne out by the way she glanced at him and nudged him forward softly with an elbow to his back. He fidgeted, his yellow eyes darting here and there and everywhere and never quite looking at Loki directly. "Hello," he muttered, and his voice was even more heavily accented than the girl's. "I'm... I... haff heard a lot about you."

"Yes?" Loki encouraged when the young man stopped there, seeming unwilling to go on.

"We heard that you have a different way that you look, sometime," Anna Marie butted in helpfully, when Kurt seemed unable to. Up close, he could see that what he had taken for age-silver in her hair was merely a single shock of white that had been combed back into the dark mane of it; he was unsure whether this was cosmetic, or a manifestation of her mutation. "If you don't mind too terribly, would you be willing to show us?"

Loki frowned. A part of him instinctively bristled at being treated like a circus sideshow, for children to gawp at for their amusement, but - surely of all the places in the Nine Realms, this was the least likely to sport such idle onlookers. And besides...

He glanced at Kurt, then at Hank, who was watching the by-play with interest. Loki had always been a chameleon, by personality as well as inclination; he'd always felt a silent but palpable compulsion to fit in, to match his look to those around him. Whenever Thor and his friends had journeyed to other realms, Loki had taken a habit of adopting whatever the local look was - on Vanaheim, Alfheim, or Nornheim. Sometimes that was a simple matter of changing his clothes; sometimes it was more. The only place he'd been that he'd never felt any inclination to fit in was in Jotunheim.

The Frost Giants had been his enemies; he'd no desire to look like them. But he was not among enemies now. After a long moment he nodded slowly in acquiescence, and closed his eyes, concentrating. His hands folded around the cold ceramic of his drink for inspiration, reminding him of the burning sweep of ice; after a moment, he felt the change begin to emanate from his hands upwards.

His eyes, when he opened them again, were crimson. They darted anxiously to his audience to check their reaction, but Hank and Anna Marie merely looked interested and perhaps a little pleased. Kurt's interest, however, sharpened on him to an almost painful intensity.

It was clear that the young man had more he wanted to say, but he seemed at a loss for words. After a moment Hank stood up, pushing his chair back from the table with a rumble of metal over stone. "Why don't I go refill these drinks for us?" he suggested pleasantly, collecting the mugs. "Rogue, Kurt, would you care for something?"

Kurt shook his head, but the girl - Rogue? - piped up with an "Iced tea, thanks."

"Iced seems to be the theme for the day," Hank said with a smile at him, then lumbered off towards the counter. It was an obvious move to give Kurt some privacy, the more so when Rogue shot her friend a quick thumbs up of encouragement and followed Hank to the counter, leaving the two of them alone.

Loki gave all his attention to the strange young man before him. "Would you care to sit?" he said, indicating the empty chair. Kurt nodded, but instead of sitting normally he climbed onto the chair and crouched there; for the first time Loki saw a long sinuous blue tail that followed his movements, flicking now in agitation like a cat's. The tail probably explained the preference to perch rather than sitting; Loki recalled that some of the more exotic inhabitants of Alfheim were the same way.

Loki cocked his head to the side. "Is there something you want to ask?" he prompted. He was expecting to give another lesson on the history of the Frost Giants, but Kurt's question took him by surprise.

"Ze markings," Kurt blurted, and gestured towards him in a general way that encompassed his skin. "I, I vas just vondering..."

His accent was thicker now, his words slow and hesitant to the point where Loki was left wondering if he was slow of mind - though that did not seem to square with the portrait of a mischievous young man that Hank had painted for him with words. Suddenly he remembered that the peoples of Midgard did not all speak the same language; perhaps this young man came from one of the other kingdoms of the realm and was not proficient in the tongue of this one.

"You know, you can speak to me in the language you are most comfortable with," Loki told him encouragingly. "I will understand you."

Kurt looked startled, but after a moment he spoke again, and his accent was less noticeable. "You speak German?" he asked.

"I speak all tongues," Loki said vaguely; he would explain the All-Speak if asked, but he somehow doubted that was what the boy had come to talk about.

Surprisingly, Kurt nodded understanding. "Oh, like Doug does," he said.

"What about the... markings?" Loki prompted him, when he still hadn't continued after a moment.

"Well, I was wondering if they had some meaning," Kurt said, and although his speech was more fluid now it was clear that he was still hesitant. "I... like mine do."

That was not the question Loki was expecting, and he blinked and looked closer. Though so dark as to be nearly black, he could see now that Kurt's skin was covered in places with fine raised lines, traveling in curving patterns over the contours of his skin. It was a resemblance he hadn't expected to find, and one that left Loki wondering once more uneasily what exactly the mutants _were._ It seemed too unlikely that such resemblance was a coincidence; no wonder the young man had been curious.

"I don't know," he answered at last, frowning as he turned it over in his mind. "I... the other Frost Giants have them, but I do not know whether or not they have any significance. Whether they indicate clan lineage, or are merely individual patternings, like a fingerprint or a zebra's stripes."

"I understand," Kurt said, but he seemed even more unhappy and tense. This conversation was getting more bizarre by the minute. _Just say what you wish to say,_ Loki thought at him impatiently. _If I know the answer I'll tell you._

Kurt fidgeted some more, and then blurted out, "I just wanted to know... are they something that you did to yourself?"

"To myself? No!" Loki was taken aback, and his mind ratcheted through the implications of the question. Not markings, as the Jotun had, but scars; but so many, so much pain. "Wait, are you saying that yours _are?_ That you did that to _yourself?"_

Both Loki's answer and his return question obviously upset Kurt; he crouched down further in the chair, his tail drooping miserably. "Yes," he said.

Loki started at Kurt in astonishment. "Whatever for?"

Kurt just looked miserable, and did not answer. Loki frowned, mind ratcheting over possibilities. "Are they battle-markings, then?" he offered. He had seen some of the older berserkers of Asgard with similar decorations, although normally they began with a scar earned in great battle and carved the skin around it to emphasize their courage. And Xavier did say that some of his students were warriors. "They do make you look quite fearsome," he offered encouragingly.

Unfortunately, that seemed to have been the wrong thing to say; Kurt huddled down even further in the chair and looked about to cry. "No... I..." he stammered, his yellow eyes darting around as if for an escape. "Never... never mind. I should go... sorry to have bothered you..."

Loki felt a faint tingle, like a tickling against his skin, the instant before Kurt simply disappeared. There was a faint _bamf_ ing noise as the air rushed to fill the space where he'd been a moment before, but no other trace of him. Loki was left behind, clutching his mug of melted iced chocolate and very confused.

Hank returned to the table, frowning to find Loki alone; he set a new drink and pastry in front of Loki and sat down opposite him. "Kurt left in a hurry then?" he asked. "Something wrong?"

"I... am not at all sure," Loki said hesitantly. He was getting a bad feeling that he'd made a mistake somehow, and waited nervously for Hank to call him on it. "He asked me if I was born with these markings -" he gestured at his own still-blue skin - " - but I believe I may have said something to upset him."

"Hmm." Hank took a sip of his coffee, then sighed. "Well, I'm sure he won't hold it against you. He's surprisingly forgiving, considering what a life he's had."

"Did he not inherit his appearance from his parents, then?" Loki asked curiously. Hank and Xavier both spoke of mutants as being the 'next step' in human evolution; but at least in a comparison between humans and Frost Giants, Kurt seemed rather more than one step ahead.

Hank shrugged. "Most likely not, since mutants only really became common in the last two generations," he said. "But we don't know for sure, because Kurt never knew either of his birth parents."

"Birth parents?" Loki said, confused. Was there any other kind?

"Kurt was adopted," Hank explained. "I don't know all the details - I prefer not to pry, really. But I know that however it happened, he never knew either of his biological parents."

"Oh," Loki said, almost inaudible.

He continued to chat with Hank through the rest of the other man's coffee, but he was not really attending. Hank sensed his distraction and bid him a good afternoon, inviting him to return at the same time next week. Loki discarded the empty pastry wrapper in the bin and left, the blue melting away from his skin as he walked out to join the rest of the crowds.

* * *

Today was the one-week mark since Loki had come to the school, and Charles intended to ask him how he was settling in. Although he had sent out a memo to the teachers and staff advising them of Loki's presence (and a somewhat differently worded notice to the X-Men, letting them know that Loki was a very strong potential ally they were in the process of courting) he simply had too much else on his plate to spend as much time with the young god as he'd like.

He knew in a general way, of course - he had kept tabs on Loki throughout the week, and seen him on Monday and Wednesday nights. In their last meeting Loki had (somewhat reluctantly) admitted that most of his knowledge of the Frost Giants came from third-party sources, and he knew very little about them first-hand. But the books and annals that predated the Jotnar war, he was now certain, spoke about the Frost Giants in much more frank and nonjudgmental terms than the ones written afterwards. It was unfortunate that those later texts - many of them children's stories, from the sound of it - had been the first to inform Loki of where Frost Giants belonged in the order of things.

When Loki blew into his office shortly after the clock struck nine, though, he had a preoccupied frown on his face and something entirely different on his mind. "Are you aware that your groundskeeper is a spy?" Loki asked him. "I sensed a strong power coming from his soul. The form he wears is not his true form, and I cannot see any possible benign motive for hiding himself thus."

This was _not_ the conversation he'd been planning to have tonight. "...I'm aware," Charles managed to say.

He hadn't been, actually - or at least not specifically - but as soon as Loki said it, Charles knew who it was and why. Raven - Mystique - would not have come to the school of her own volition; she must be here on Erik's orders. But was his old friend planning his next move, or simply keeping an eye on the competition? He'd have to find out, and prepare a countermove.

"Then why do you not do something about it?" Loki demanded impatiently. "Kill him, or at least expel him from the grounds? He is but one, and not so powerful that you could not easily overcome him."

Charles shook his head slightly. "Sometimes it is wiser to keep a spy in place, if you know about him," he said. "After all, if you expel one spy the enemy may try to plant another on you, one you don't know about. And this way, you can feed your enemy whatever information you choose."

Loki started to speak, then stopped, giving Charles a long look. Doubts and questions whispered through his mind, but he smothered them. "That's not your entire reason," he said quietly.

"No, but the rest of the reason I will keep to myself for now," Charles sighed. "If this spy makes a move to threaten any of the students, I will take steps, but I very much doubt that will happen." He brooded for a moment, then added, "I hope you didn't do anything to indicate to the groundskeeper that you are aware of their deception."

Loki snorted. "What do you take me for, an amateur?"

Charles smiled. It was easy to forget, despite the particularly _unfinished_ sense to his psyche that marked a growing teenager, that Loki had lived for hundreds of years already. No, he was definitely not an amateur. "Thank you for telling me, Loki. I greatly appreciate your efforts to keep the school safe," he said. Then he changed the subject. "So I heard you were introduced to Anna Marie and Kurt Wagner today."

Loki sobered, the hint of playfulness fading. "Yes," he said. "I... fear I may have said something to offend him, although I did not intend to." He divulged this piece of information stiffly, as though apprehensive it would earn him some reprimand.

"I'm sure he'll understand if you tell him so, and he has a forgiving nature," Charles replied. "Despite the somewhat less than auspicious start, I would like it if you and Kurt got to know each other better. The two of you have quite a bit in common."

Loki's expression went flat and blank, but it was easy to read the flurry of emotions that this kicked up. "Yes, Dr. McCoy said as much," he said. He started to say something else, then broke off, shaking his head.

"What did Hank say?" Charles encouraged him.

Slowly, unwillingly, Loki continued; "He said something about Kurt's... 'birth parents.' What did he mean by that?"

Perhaps it shouldn't have surprised Charles that out of the whole conversation, that particular piece was what Loki would focus on. But then, Charles knew very little about how adoption worked (or didn't work) on Asgard. He didn't know how much of a common cultural template they had. "It's the common term for one's biological antecedents," he answered. "So called distinguish them from the parents who raise you."

"Are your birth parents not your true parents, though?" Loki argued. "By definition. It is they who create you, after all."

Charles shrugged. "Perhaps," he allowed. "You could argue that the true definition of parents are those who actually _parent_ you, and those who sired you a mere accident of birth. As a geneticist, I can assure you that birth is only the first step in the creation of a person."

Loki frowned, rising from his chair to pace slowly around the room, one hand coming up to rub at his mouth as he was lost in thought. His mind kept calling up pictures of Kurt, the memory filled with an uneasy recognition of _self_ in that image. "Did those he was born to cast him out, then, when they saw his deformities?" he wondered aloud. "Was he picked up by some passing traveler who thought he might be _useful?_ "

Charles decided to back off the topic a bit. "Kurt's story is his own to tell, not mine to divulge," he said. Hoping to steer Loki's thoughts in a more positive direction, he added, "But yes, he was raised by his adoptive mother, and they were quite close for most of his life."

Loki looked over at him. "How did they hide his appearance?" he asked.

"As far as I know, they didn't," Charles replied. Things might have been much easier for Kurt if they had, but at least he had known all his life that there were those who loved him for what he truly was.

Loki's thoughts seemed to be following in parallel. "And yet his mother still loved him, even looking as he did..." He trailed off. _From the hour that Odin took me, my skin was Asgardian. Frigga knew, she always knew but she said nothing. Because she agreed with Odin, or because she feared to disagree with him? She said she loved me, that I was hers, that she didn't want me to feel different. But did she ever see the truth of the monster she had taken in? Would she have felt differently if she had? Would she still... I never asked, and now I'll never know._

Like a train switching tracks, Loki's mental soundtrack wrenched abruptly away from the lingering thoughts of his mother. Whether because it still hurt to think of her, or because he didn't want the anger that simmered under his skin to be directed at her, he didn't know. Perhaps some of both. "At least _his_ parents never lied to him about what he was," Loki said darkly. "I suppose they could not have, without the capacity to cover up his differences. I wonder how they explained him to others...?"

Charles sighed. "Loki, I've already said that Kurt's story is not mine to tell. I won't reveal private information about any of my other students. If you wish to know these things, you'll need to talk to Kurt directly, once you're at the point where he trusts you enough to share such things." He paused. "But this isn't really about Kurt, is it? It's about you."

That stopped Loki in his tracks. The cloud of his emotions seethed and roiled.

"You told me once that I was only defining myself by negatives, by what I desired _not_ instead of what I desired," Loki said finally. "If that's so, I think I must have learned it from him. The very first thing he wished of me, though I never remembered it, was to have me be _not_ what I am - to hide my true skin and take on a more acceptable guise. And so it went for the rest of my life. Be less of a mage, less of a trickster. Be less trouble. Be less _Loki_.

Loki began to pace more rapidly now, crossing Charles' office in a few strides and flinging himself around to go back again. Charles let him talk, deciding after some consideration to keep his own response to a minimum. This has been inside Loki for a very long time now and needs to come out, like a wound that has festered and must be drained before it can heal. More than anything else - more than sage wisdom or trite platitudes - Charles judged that Loki simply needed to speak, knowing that he would be heard.

"He hardly ever spoke to me except in terms of _no -_ Loki, stop, Loki no, Loki, do not do this. He never told me _what he wanted of me_ except to be _not._ He told me that when he first took me he had plans for me, but that those plans no longer mattered," Loki continued. "Did he never think of another destiny for me? Did he ever think of what he wanted of me - of _me,_ not for Thor through me? Did he ever think on me at all?"

A voice whispered in Loki's memory: _There is always a reason for **everything** your father does, Loki. _ "Was _this_ his plan all along?" he wondered aloud, voice shaking. "To shape me into the monster he knew me to be by birth? To make me into the perfect foil for the hero he wanted his son to be - to give him a pet monster to _practice on?_ "

"I don't know," Charles said quietly.

"Why not?" Loki said, suddenly rounding on him. His eyes were wild, his posture radiating menace - although Charles knew that the anger was not directed at him, not truly. "Why don't you know? You know so many other things. You are so very, _very_ sure of yourself," he bit out acidly. "Why can you not tell me that _surely_ my father loves me? Why don't you tell me that he only ever meant the best?"

"...Because I don't know your father, Loki," Charles sighed. "I've never met him and I cannot sense his thoughts. I will only ever tell you things I know for certain to be true."

"THEN LIE TO ME!" Loki roared. "Tell me that my father loved me. Tell me that all he did - all the times he punished me, so much more harshly than he ever did Thor - tell me that he only did it because he wanted to make me _better_ , and not because he still wanted to punish my father through me! Tell me that he saw himself in me, all that was sneaky and clever and deceitful that _I learned from him_ , and was not ashamed. Tell me that there was something, anything that I could have done, should have done to make him proud! TELL ME!"

Silence fell in the office, punctuated only by the sound of the ticking clock, of Loki's harsh panting. For all he guarded himself against emotional spillover from his students, Charles felt his heart breaking along with Loki's. "I can't," he said. "I'm sorry."

Because no matter how much Loki wanted to hear sweet reassurances, the base of trust between himself and his father had been broken by just such a lie. If Loki was ever to trust him, Charles could not ever lie to him, not about something like this.

Loki's expression crumpled like a boy's, and before Charles could say anything else he dropped to his knees, long body folding in on itself as he hunched over his knees. A mangled noise escaped his control, his hand fisting by his mouth as though he could catch the sound before it escaped.

"Loki," Charles called gently, and without conscious thought Loki transferred his misery to the arm of Charles' chair, his left hand clutching unconsciously at Charles' knee. _Mother gone, father gone, Asgard closed forever,_ the litany of loss went in his head. Those simple phrases lashed around like branches in a windstorm, emotion beyond reason, and the rain soon followed. _All I have left is this. All I have left is here._

Charles put one gentle hand on the back of Loki's neck, offering warmth and support, and waited for the storm to run its course.

* * *

~to be continued...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am doing a bit of mix-and-match with regards to certain elements of Kurt's character in this fic. His childhood background is mostly taken from the comics, but the element of his scarification and the motive behind it is taken from the second X-men movie (since as far as I can tell, it's not mentioned elsewhere.) I am also aware that Kurt's personality is usually somewhat lighter than this one, but he's rather understandably distressed by the topics at hand.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A few cracks begin to appear in the idyll.

Somehow, before he even quite realized it was happening, Loki's schedule slowly filled up. It was a jarring transition from the slow, patient pace of life in Asgard - which measured things by years or decades, or perhaps moons if they were in a particular hurry - to the hectic, jerky, seven-day cycle that Midgard for some reason favored. Mortals rushed from one day to the next, hurrying towards the end of the week - and then no sooner did the week-end arrive than it was over, and the whole carnival schedule started over again.

On Mondays and Wednesdays Loki gave his lecture on the cosmology of the Nine Realms to large classes of students at once. While his cosmology lectures were aimed at teaching the basics and interesting as many of the children as possible in what lay outside the borders of their Realm, it was more flash and spectacle than serious scholarship. But a smaller number of students showed genuine interest in a more serious, intensive study of the history of the Nine Realms in general and Asgard in particular, and so he felt obliged to meet with them twice a week after the initial lectures to fill in the details.

Then there were his defense classes, starting early in the mornings on Tuesdays and Thursdays and continuing on well past noon, as he broke up the class into their levels of ability and practiced with them more intensively. He was not to be granted respite during the afternoons, however; as soon as word had gotten around the faculty about his easy displays of _seidr_ in the classroom, the other teachers were all mad to find out how did it. Somehow, what had started out as a casual 'little demonstration' as requested by Hank McCoy had devolved into a sort of unofficial metaphysics workshop, meeting on Thursdays and Saturdays to compare Loki's talents with various mutant powers and debate interminably about how similar or different their sources really were. (If he were being perfectly honest with himself, Loki _did_ find the discussions fascinating, but by the time Saturday rolled around after a long week of wrangling with young mutants, Loki wanted nothing more than to _rest._ Retreat to his apartment, lock the door, draw the curtains, turn off all the lights, sit in the overstuffed armchair and just _rest._ )

He still met with Xavier three evenings out of the week to talk, about topics ranging from Asgard to Svartalfheim to Thanos to _seidr_ to his students to anything else that was weighing on Loki's mind at the time. Xavier had, as ever, an uncanny ability to perceive Loki's mood, and on the rawer days he kept the topics on far-ranging subjects of politics and war. Only on the good days, when Loki felt strong enough for it, did he press Loki about the topics that hurt him most: his father, his brother, his time with the Chitauri, _home._

But not about Frigga. Never once in their sessions did they talk about Frigga; Loki found himself steadfastly avoiding all thoughts of her. He had been away from Asgard, he reasoned, for long periods of time before without being unduly plagued by thoughts of his mother - why should now be different? What had really changed in the day-to-day life of Loki, outcast of Asgard, whether his mother was gone or simply held out of his reach?

So he thought not on her. As long as he kept his mind on the tasks before him, he need not dwell on memories of her or the pain that they inevitably brought. And so long as he did not think on her, he didn't miss her.

Not at all.

Well, not much.

Not much at all.

* * *

One distinct advantage that the 'workshops' had over the classes with children, Loki could not deny, was that there was a great deal more drinking involved. Indeed, all of the faculty at Xavier's School for Mutants had a fondness for alcohol that Loki could not imagine his own stuffy tutors indulging in - but then, considering that the instructors here had to deal with nearly a hundred superpowered mutant children instead of just one shapeshifting brat, perhaps it was understandable. They would gather at a taproom - (or as Hank preferred to call it, the dispensary) near the outside edge of campus and get their drinking and talking out of the way at once.

Loki was not particularly impressed by the alcohol of Midgard (although several of the teachers that hailed from further away assured him that the alcohol served in _their_ countries was much finer) but he drank anyway, to keep company. Truly, he found the slight warm glow that was all Midgard's pitiful excuse for mead for instill in him to be more than sufficient; he had no mind to drink himself into a state of foolishness around these people he still did not know well.

This Thursday night, he was nursing the last of what Cecilia had referred to as a 'martini' with Hank and Jean Grey as the evening wound down. Cecilia Reyes, the dark-skinned healer, was engaged in quiet conversation with the battle-scarred blacksmith known simply as Forge. The two of them had been very interested in Loki's descriptions of Asgardian healing magic, speculating to what extent it would be possible to duplicate it with Midgardian technology; now they were arguing between themselves the exact differences between magic and technology. Since the distinction was rather lost on Loki - all of what they described fell under what Asgard would consider 'magic,' that was to say, using artificial enhancements to accomplish anything that could not be done by natural means - he had very little to contribute to that conversation.

The conversation, as it often did, had worked its way around to the antics of various students in their classes. "...and so we made a special chair for him, with slots in the back to accommodate his spines," Hank was saying. "And as far as that went, that was fine. But he had this bad habit during class of pushing his chair back - you know - balancing on two back legs while he put his feet on the desk. Well, one day one of his classmates surprised him - snuck up on him - and he lost his balance and fell backwards - right onto his spines! The floor was wood, of course, and the tips dug so hard into the seam between the boards that he was completely stuck. It took two teachers and a set of spreader clamps to get him shaken loose again."

"I'm telling you," Jean said, rolling her eyes playfully, "You never had him, but Kurt was worse. I'm not even sure how he did it but I walked into homeroom one day to find _every chair and desk_ stuck upside-down in the ceiling. And there he was, sitting in his own desk - on the ceiling - pretending that everything was completely normal..."

"It's hard to top Kurt stories," Hank agreed. "I do rather regret that he was never in any of my classes."

Loki could have topped that story with any number from his own childhood in Asgard, but for some reason he refrained. He did not wish to make a point how different his upbringing had been from any of theirs, and the events of the past few years had left a bitter tinge to all of those memories, even the fond ones of outwitting the tutors and escaping through the windows to spend the day romping the palace grounds with...

Well, it was all water under the bridge now.

"If it comes to desks and chairs," Loki said, "I believe I have one. The other day during my History of Vanaheim session, Katherine - you know, Kitty Pryde - was starting to nod off to sleep at one of those strange desk-chairs in the red room. It came into my mind to teach her a lesson, so I left an image of myself at the lectern and stole around behind her. It was my thought to pull her desk back across the floor, just to startle her - to teach her the merits of staying alert, you understand. But when I took hold of the chair to pull it out, it passed right through her legs! She'd phased when she'd fallen asleep, you see, and so she just kept sitting there in mid-air with nothing beneath her."

Hank burst out laughing, and Loki smiled in triumph as he took a drought of his mug. "That poor girl, Loki," Hank chided him, even as he continued to chuckle. "You really shouldn't be so mean to her."

Loki snorted. "I have better things to do with my time than teach to children who can't even bring themselves to stay awake during the lesson," he said. "I don't understand why she bothers to come to those classes, if she has no care for the knowledge."

"Don't you?" Hank leaned forward, his eyes twinkling. "I dare say her interest is more in the teacher than in the subject. Or hadn't you realized by now that our Kitty is harboring an enormous crush on you?"

Loki stared at the Beast, sputtering slightly as he tried to come up with a response. 'You're joking,' was the obvious one, but he could tell that Hank was being entirely too truthful - or at least believed he was. "Surely you must be mistaken," he managed instead.

Hank chuckled. "I don't believe I am," he said.

Jean put in, "According to her roommate, she's been seeking out and acquiring pictures of you from any possible source - the yearbook, newspaper clippings from New York, anything - and turning them into a positive shrine in the corner of their room."

Loki made a strangled noise that could not even charitably be described as a word, and Hank laughed at him again. His mirth quieted in the next moment, though, and he leaned forward slightly with a serious air. "I trust that I don't have to remind you not to do anything to _act_ on her infatuation?" he said, with just the slightest rumble of threat in his voice.

"Certainly not," Loki said indignantly. "She's only a _child."_ As lonely as he might have been in the past few years - _decades -_ for affection and companionship, he was not _desperate._

"Glad to hear it," Jean murmured.

"A child, perhaps, but growing up quickly," Hank said, turning serious. "She could do great things, you know."

"Yes, I can imagine," Loki said, relaxing somewhat now that the conversation had moved away from the ridiculous prospect of student infatuation. "With her power - if she learns to use it properly - she could be a great spy."

"I don't know about that," Jean said. "But I think Hank was referring more to her future as an X-Man."

Loki scowled. "An X-Man? The warrior band that Professor Xavier talked about?" he demanded incredulously. "That's absurd! She's not qualified for battle - absolutely not."

"What, because she's a girl?" Jean cocked an eyebrow at him, and Loki rolled his eyes.

"That's exactly why - because she's still only a _girl_ ," he said firmly. "Not even yet a woman. Both men and women can be born with the passion for battle - but just because they _can_ doesn't mean that they _are._ Kitty doesn't have the right temperament to be a warrior, and likely never will. Teaching her to defend herself is one thing, but it would be cruel to subject her to the brutality of the battlefield if there was any chance not to."

He was diverted for a moment to brood on his own words. In Asgard, of course, men were expected to become warriors and women were not. There were a few exceptions, like Sif, who clawed her way past Asgard's prejudices with a single-minded fury for blood, and won the respect of the warrior class thereby. But however strange and unnatural a woman warrior seemed to them, a _man_ who had no taste for battle was even worse. Sif at least had been able to win a grudging respect for them, but a man who preferred the gentler arts never would.

How much different might Loki's life had been, if he had grown up among people who had respected his choice to walk another path? How different, if there had ever _been_ a choice in the first place?

Hank sighed. "Just between you and me, I think you're right," he said ruefully. "But it's not really up to us. Professor X himself wants Kitty to be ready to go on active duty as soon as possible."

_"What?"_

"He has his reasons," Jean told him gravely.

"I can't imagine any reasons that would explain such foolishness!"

"They need Kitty - and specifically Kitty - for what she can do that no one else can," Hank said. "You know what her power is, do you not?"

Loki gave a short, jerky nod. "She can phase through matter, passing through it while leaving herself untouched," he said. "Hardly a great offensive capability - unless he plans to employ her as a spy?"

"No, no," Hank assured him. The big blue man glanced aside furtively, then leaned back in to Loki and lowered his voice. "This goes no further, my friend, do you understand?"

"My lips are sealed to silence," Loki swore solemnly, even as his ears pricked and quivered. What was this now - secrets kept from their own people? That _he_ might gather? He put on his most encouraging manner.

"The anti-mutant faction in the government is picking up steam again," Hank told him soberly. "They've revived the Sentinel project, and our inside sources say that it's really going forward now - they've reverse engineered some of the junked copies of Tony Stark's technology, and have developed a brand new breed of fighting machines. Machines that can move and fight and think on their own, every one of them packed with an entire arsenal of killing firepower - and the latest in portable genetic scanning technology. They intend to release these killing machines into the general public, to hunt down and kill every mutant they can find."

"Is there no law and order in this kingdom?" Loki said incredulously. "What court, what body of judges would possibly allow such a thing?"

"They don't," Jean said. "Legally speaking, this is all shady as hell. But that won't stop them from going ahead with it anyway, while denying to the public up down and backwards that they're doing any such thing."

"Eventually, their cover will slip and word will get out to the public, there will be enough witnesses willing to come forward to make a case of it, and _hopefully_ the courts will put a stop to it - but that could take months, years!" Hank exclaimed. "Will we just sit back and allow them to make innocent mutants martyr to the cause in the meantime? We will not - we _cannot!"_

"But why Kitty?" Loki pressed. "What's so special about her?"

"You know she can pass through matter and be unaffected from it," Hank said. "But the things she passes through are _not_ always unaffected. Anything electronic or circuitry-based is completely fried when she phases through it - and that makes her absolutely invaluable against the Sentinels. They can't touch her, but _she_ can destroy them with a touch. She can accomplish alone what an entire brigade of fighting mutants wouldn't be able to do - take down the Sentinels."

"I see," Loki said slowly, his thoughts spinning.

"Do you see why Professor X is so set on getting her ready to fight?" Jean sighed. "Hopefully, it won't come to that - he won't assign her to the active squad unless he absolutely has to. But if it _does_ come that far, she has to be as ready as we can help her to be."

"I had not realized that the mutant's position in this kingdom was so... tenuous," Loki said. _Dire,_ was what he actually thought. "Your own government seeks war with you?" He'd been aware - from observing the dynamic between Fury and Xavier upon the Helicarrier - that relations between mortals and mutants were somewhat strained. But Fury, whatever his _myriad_ deficiencies, had been able to put aside his prejudices to call upon the wisdom and power of the mutants in the person of Charles Xavier. Was Fury not a commanding force in the government of this kingdom? Were they truly so two-faced, so unscrupulous, so moronically short-sighted as to seek to exploit the mutants' power with one hand and war upon them with the other? _Apparently so._

Hank grimaced. "If it were only the government that would be bad enough," he said. "But public sentiment has taken a turn for a worse, as well - people are frightened, and they'll vote for anything or anyone who promises to be 'tough on freaks.' The X-Men have been out in the field for weeks at a time - mostly acting as body guards, or breaking up anti-mutant riots. That's why you haven't been introduced yet to any of the X-Men aside from Ororo and Jean - and my humble self, of course."

"You? You are an X-Man?" Loki said, surprised. His gentle, scholarly friend was not at all what Loki imagined when he thought of Xavier's mysterious squad of mutant warriors. He had pictured another team like Storm - hot-tempered, disdainful and righteous, bubbling over with leashed power and the intent to fight and kill.

Hank grinned at him, his teeth suddenly looking very white and sharp against the dark blue background. "Indeed I am, my friend - or at least, I was. I was one of Charles Xavier's original proteges back in the 1960s, when he was first starting out. One of the originals. But time marches on, and I am no longer as young and spry as I once was. And since spryness was my primary stock in trade - well." He looked momentarily embarrassed.

"It could be worse, Jean murmured, and she and Hank shared a look.

"Ah, well," Hank said in a tone of forced cheeriness. "There are worse fates for an old soldier than retiring to a life of ease in the countryside, imparting our wisdom to the next generation!"

But Loki's mind was still on the public sentiment' comment from earlier. "A poor measure of gratitude these peasants show to you - returning your attempts to protect and do good with hatred and violence," Loki said, half to himself.

Hank grimaced. "Would that I could say they have no reason to fear us. Unfortunately, we're not the only mutants out there - not even the only mutants to organize themselves. And the Broth -" He cut himself off abruptly, lips pressing into a tight line, embarrassed.

Jean glanced at him warningly. _Watch it, Hank,_ Loki heard her voice whisper at the very edges of his thought.

If Loki were a cat or a wolf, his ears would be pointed high, quivering at attention. But he forced himself to act casual, unconcerned. "Oh, yes - that is the faction led by Erik Lensherr, is it not?" he said offhandedly. "Professor Xavier told me all about him." _And if Xavier trusted me with that information, you know I must be trustworthy to hear the rest, mustn't I?_

Hank relaxed slowly. "The Brotherhood of Mutants, that's right," he agreed. "Frankly speaking, I don't think they could have come up with a name that more clearly screams 'Hello, we're terrorists!' if they tried."

Loki laughed. "They make mischief for you, do they?" he said sympathetically.

"Far worse than mere _mischief,"_ Hank said bitterly. "They're a bloody menace, to us and the humans alike - bombings, kidnappings, attacks orchestrated on major public monuments, even assassination attempts. Every time we try to prove our good faith to the government, the Brotherhood is right there with some nasty choreographed event to make us all look like a group of bloodthirsty savages. It's a vicious cycle - the Brotherhood commits an atrocity, the government cracks down in response. A new group of mutants gets victimized, and the Brotherhood gets a new batch of recruits looking for revenge.

"And they'll attack the X-Men in the field, too," Jean said, her grey eyes snapping with anger. "Professor X keeps claiming that Magneto has honor in his own way, but _I've_ certainly never seen it in action. Too many of my friends have been hurt trying to put a stop to that madman's schemes."

Hank sighed. "We're fighting a war on two fronts, and every time we start to get anywhere they push us back." Glumly, he took another swig of his beer.

"It sounds like you are beset on all sides, indeed," Loki agreed. "Perhaps you need to seek allies farther afield."

"Well, that's why _you're_ here," Hank said, wiping foam away from his dark lips. A moment later he seemed to realize how cold-blooded that sounded, because he blurted out "Not - not that I wouldn't be thrilled to have you here otherwise of course - no offense intended."

"None taken," Loki agreed, more amused than offended by the little slip of the tongue - it was not as though he was any stranger to _realpolitik,_ and he knew well that Xavier's interest in cultivating him as an ally was one reason Xavier had exhorted him so persistently to come here.

Not that he intended to be anyone's pawn but his own. This 'brotherhood of mutants' sounded like a menace indeed, but Loki's busy mind always worked to examine all sides of a new issue, looking for an angle to insinuate himself. One man's terrorist was another man's freedom fighter, after all, and from everything he'd heard about mortals' attitudes towards mutants, the mortal government needed no prompting from Erik Lensherr to commit atrocities. Who had committed what acts in response to whom was a bit of a chicken-and-the-egg question, and pretty much moot by this point.

And if there was a pool of hurt and angry mutants that had been wronged by the government, then it was no surprise that many of them sought out the side that promised them payback for those slights. It was only natural - justice or vengeance, whatever you chose to call it, the natural reaction of one who had been wronged was to even the score. By contrast, to ally yourselves with your former enemies and protect them from your own kind must be a tremendously difficult choice to make, and Loki couldn't see how so many of them did it.

Unless of course it was not allegiance to a higher ideal that inspired them, but rather allegiance to Charles Xavier. Loyalty to the man who carried the banner of peace and forgiveness and shared humanity, the triumph of love over hatred. Loyalty to the man who had saved them all, and lifted them from whatever swamp of pain or rage or despair they had once been mired in.

 _That,_ Loki could understand all too well.

* * *

It was near midnight before the last of the drinking party broke up - actually they had ceased drinking some time earlier, but Cecilia had been very concerned by the possibility of 'driving while drunk,' and so Jean and Loki had lingered to chat with her until she felt safe enough to attempt it. The both of them lived on campus and so need not concern themselves with such things, as their apartments were only a short walk away. He could have just teleported the short distance to his apartment, but the time spent outside helped to clear his head, and the cold never bothered him anyway.

The days were shortening rapidly as Midgard scrambled towards winter, and with the warmth of the sun hours gone a wet and frigid chill had settled over the campus. Orange-yellow lamps hung from the eaves of buildings and overhung the roads and walkways, though they were too weak to really illuminate more than the shadows concealed. Loki walked through the darkness under the leafless trees, bare twigs trembling with the weight of the autumn fog, and his breath blew away from him in clouds.

The more time he spent with the _seidmenn_ of Midgard, the scholars and healers and mages that lived and worked at Xavier's school, the more they had come to pester him about his biology. Jean Grey and Forge had both expressed interest in putting him before scanners to take measurements of him while he demonstrated his powers; Cecilia and Hank both wanted tissue and blood samples in order to examine his DNA. The thought of having his inner self pawed over, though, bothered Loki in a way he could not quite name.

He found something about their frank curiosity off-putting, even if he could recognize the spirit of true scholarly inquiry that drove it. It was not that he did not understand their desire to know more about the enigma that was Frost Giants in general and himself in particular - he himself knew far less about the topic than he wished too, and it maddened him not to know where to turn to find the answers. They were curious, and he was curious too, it was just that... he did not want them to be curious _at the same time._ Didn't want to share his findings, whatever they might be, with others just yet.

What did he fear - that they would seek out his weaknesses and use them against him? It wasn't unthinkable, Loki had to admit; yet these men and women were loyal to Xavier, and Xavier already had the power to take him apart, if he so wished. Did he fear, instead, that they would stumble upon some yet hidden secret in his flesh - in his bones - so repugnant as to turn them against him forever? Could their clever machines and scanners and tests register the presence of sin, of corruption? Did he fear their curiosity because they were not his friends, or because they were the only friends he had and he did not like to risk them? _Or both?_

He was drawn out of his ruminations (not _brooding)_ by a sudden distant commotion coming off from the left. The campus was hushed, and the noises muffled by distance and walls, but his hearing was sharp enough to pick it out of the background. Loki frowned as the sounds drifted through the air - female voices raised in anger or distress, scuffling and shouting. He turned his head and took a few steps, trying to pinpoint the source of the sound, and caught a light burning in the window of a building several hundred yards away. If he remembered Jean's tour of the campus aright, that building was one of the student dormitories - one of the girls' dormitories, specifically.

For a moment Loki hesitated. He was not here to play campus police, and really of all the faculty and staff on the conference, the _last_ one to be taking a firm hand towards youthful exuberance would be the _God of Mischief._ He had certainly made enough messes in his own youth (usually with, sometimes without Thor in attendance) that he had no moral ground to interfere on anyone else's save perhaps to criticize their technique.

However, as he hesitated, the female voices rose in volume again and this time, Loki was able to pick out the shrill note of distress in them. He set his teeth and swung off the path, marching towards the girls' dormitory with firmer purpose. Best go and see what this was all about, then; if it turned out to be too much trouble, he could always call one of the other teachers.

But as he turned a corner and the girls' dorm came in view, a subtle flickering light caught his attention - not just in the windows, but crawling along the corners and the edge of the roof, as well. It was a sullen red-orange glow that had not the right look for Midgard's electric lights, nor for a true fire.

It was mage-light, and all thoughts of leaving to find another teacher fled. This was _his_ area of expertise, and he was far more equipped to handle it than any of the rest of them (save perhaps Xavier himself.) Loki's steps quickened and became more forceful as he strode towards the eerily lit dorm.

Loki strode up to the front stoop, a lamp glowing in a wrought iron cage flanking either side of the door, and knocked firmly. The sounds of chaos had grown louder as he approached, and he heard several different female voices risen in chorus inside, as well as the thudding and crashing noises that _might_ have been furniture shifted about at high speeds. More disturbing than any of those, however, was the faint scent of burning that tickled his nostrils - well out of place on this cold wet night, it was not the sharp scent of woodsmoke nor the dirty reek of melting plastics that he had come all too unpleasantly to know. Instead it smelled like burning... stone?

He _could_ just break the door down, of course, but then the girls would have a broken door until someone got around to fixing it for them. He would knock once more, Loki decided, and then simply teleport inside. He raised his fist and pounded on the door once more, the noise echoing throughout the house ahead.

Just as he was raising his hand with his fingers curled into the shape of a cantrip, there was the light pattering of feet in the hallway beyond, and the door wrenched open. The girl standing beyond it in her nightgown was not one of Loki's students, and thus not one he knew well; she had huge blue eyes and curly light brown hair that tumbled past her shoulders. Her eyes were even more prominent right now due to her alarm, the whites showing all about the rim. "Yes?" she panted, evidently having come in a hurry. "Prof - Professor Loki?"

He was torn for a moment between an encouraging smile and an intimidating frown, as the smell of burning rock wafted down the hallway towards him. The crashing of furniture had halted, it seemed, but the high female voices still carried on beyond. "It seems that you young ladies are having some trouble," he noted. "If you would be so good as to stand aside and let me in, I'll see what I can do to help."

The girl's eyes got even wider, and faint golden sparkles seemed to dance around her head for a moment. "You can't do that!" she blurted. "Curfew starts at 10, guys aren't allowed inside after that."

"You cannot be serious," Loki said incredulously. "You expect me to just walk away and let you girls continue to burn the house down around you with your crude experimentations into magic?"

"Well - "

"Who is it?" a familiar-sounding voice yelled from the hallway beyond. "Tell them we've got everything under control!"

"It's Professor Loki!" the girl yelled back, keeping the door most of the way closed and blocking the open wedge with her body. Of course, since she barely came up to Loki's collarbone, that did not actually do much to restrict his view of the hallway. "He wants to come in!"

"Well, he can't!" The second speaker came out of a door down the hallway, which Loki made a mental note of, and came forward into the light. He recognized her straight dark hair and fiercely scowling face immediately, despite the light gauzy nightgown she wore; it was Tenko, one of his more avid students of the self-defense class. She shot a hard look at her classmate. "Alison, you were supposed to be taking care of the noise!" she hissed.

"Well, sorry! That much noise was too much to convert into light, it would have lit up the whole building enough that everyone would have come to investigate!" the curly-haired girl defended herself. "Half and half was about the best I could do. Nobody _should_ have been able to hear it."

"Well, evidently someone _did,"_ Tenko snapped, and turned to glare at Loki as though this were all his fault. She looked straight at him with her smooth dark eyes, and crossed her arms in a stubborn posture. "This is the girl's dorm. No men allowed!"

Loki gave an aggravated sigh and took a short step back, then concentrated before passing his hand from his the top of his head over his face and on downwards. The magic took hold on the crown of his head, an electric prickling sensation that stood his hair on end before it cascaded down across the rest of his skin. It was a change he was well-practiced in, having taken this form on many occasions during past adventures; features attenuating, lines softening, chest and hips swelling gently to fill out the silhouette. He altered his clothes as he altered the rest, if only to keep it from pinching and dragging in uncomfortable places.

Loki's hair now fell about _her_ face in tumbled waves, and her voice had changed from tenor to contralto. She leaned against the doorframe and crossed her arms, her suit coat now a cloak that draped flatteringly over her new figure. "How about now?" she demanded of the two teenage girls in the hallway. "Will this do?"

They gaped at him, then quickly disappeared behind the door for a hissed consultation. She caught some of the words, of course, although not all of them. _"How'd he..." "Magic, it has to be magic!" "Well, doesn't that mean we should..." "She might be able to..." "Fine, you tell her then!"_

After a few more moments of hurried consultation, Tenko scampered away down the hallway, and the curly-haired girl popped around the door once more. "Uhm, come on in," she squeaked as she pulled the door wide, and Loki gave her a wry smile as she breezed on into the hallway.

"What on earth is going on?" Loki asked as they walked through the hallways. Doors were opening on either side of the corridor, and small female faces in various colors peered out at them curiously; Loki recognized a few of them from her classes.

"Illyana had another nightmare," Tenko said matter-of-factly. Her nightgown was cut low in the back to accommodate a set of bright red, glossy, oval-shaped wings that protruded from her back and shoulders, decorated with black spots. They fluttered slightly as she talked, the only hint of uneasiness that escaped her pragmatic demeanor.

"So...?" Loki prompted her. Adolescent girls could be excitable, but surely nightmares were a common enough occurrence in a dormitory as not to inspire this level of commotion.

Tenko gave her a look as though she were being unbelievably stupid. "So, Illyana has magic," she said simply. "When _she_ has nightmares, they become _real_."

A door at the end of the hallway was wide open, spilling light into the corridor slightly tinted by a haze of odd-smelling smoke. The room beyond it pulsed with the uneasy glow of magelight, and Loki braced herself as she stepped over the threshold.

The room at the end of the hall was evidently part of a suite, or perhaps a common room, as it was much larger than the surrounding singles. It was filled with teenage girls at various levels of age and dress; several of them were carrying sopping wet blankets, which one of them was still using to busily stamp out a stray flame curling up the wall. Loki couldn't help but be impressed by the level of preparation and practice that went into this operation, which was evidently a usual thing for them and which they apparently refused to report to any of the teachers. Several of the students gave Loki confused or wary looks as she entered the room, evidently not recognizing her, but gave way before Tenko's air of authority.

At the eye of the hurricane of blankets and nightclothes was one bed shoved up crookedly against the wall; a small, pale-blond girl was curled up at the foot of it, sobbing, while Kitty Pryde hugged her shoulders and tried to soothe her. "It's all right, Illyana, it's all right," the older girl was murmuring. "It wasn't real, you're safe at the school."

"I can still smell it," the girl - Illyana - sobbed.

Kitty sighed. "That's 'cause you _set fire to the wallpaper,_ Illyana. Stop throwing magic around for a little bit so we can air out the room, will ya?"

"I'm not _trying_ to! I can't _help_ it!"

Despite her attempts to remain cool and professional, a part of Loki's heart went out to the girl. She herself was not unfamiliar of the hazards of having a gift of magic one could not yet fully control. Her particular power had always focused on illusions, so she had never had to worry about her unconscious fears manifesting in reality, but there had been several occasions during their childhood when Loki had startled awake casting a bolt of baelfire or frost at some imagined nighttime menace.

"Who's that?"

Every eye on the room turned to Loki, who lifted her eyebrow and crossed her arms.

" _That_ is Professor Loki," Tenko said with a toss of her head. "He - I mean, she - can do magic, too. She came to help Illyana."

"What?" Kitty said, startled. "Don't be silly, Tenko. That's not Professor Loki, that's -"

Loki raised a sardonic eyebrow at her and apparently that was enough to trigger recognition, because Kitty's eyes widened and her jaw dropped. A moment later she flushed bright red all the way down to her collarbone, and scrambled backwards with a strangled squeak until she reached the end of the bed and fell to the floor with a thud.

The kindest thing to do was probably to ignore her until she got her composure back, and so Loki headed for Illyana again, sitting down on the edge of the bed and placing her hand on the girl's forehead. Her straw-pale hair was limp with sweat, sticking to her fever-flushed forehead, and Loki frowned. The girl was feverish and clearly exhausted, worn out with the nightmares and the strain of channeling so much magic through a body so young.

"Piotr?" Illyana whispered, looking up at her through hazy eyes. "Brother, is that you?"

The one single word, _brother_ , pierced her heart as surely as a lance, but she managed to push it back in order to concentrate on the matter at hand. "No, child," Loki said. "I am Loki, and I am going to help you banish these shades."

She raised a dark frown to the rest of the girls clustered around the bed. "Why did you not tell anyone about this sooner?" she demanded, glaring around at them.

The other girls looked down and edged away, none of them wanting to meet Loki's gaze.

Illyana twisted under Loki's hand, her pale thin fingers knotting and unknotting with each other. "I asked them n-not to," she said in a voice made hoarse by crying. "I didn't want Piotr to w-worry."

"We were taking care of it her," Tenko said defiantly. Then she gave a little shrug. "Besides, what could any of the teachers have done about it? _They_ don't know anything about magic."

"But _I_ do," Loki said emphatically. She turned back to Illyana and pulled the girl around on the bed until she was facing her square-on. "Illyana, will you let me connect with you?" she asked her. She didn't really mean to take _no_ for an answer - she intended to straighten Illyana out whether the girl liked it or not - but certain kinds of magic were much stronger with the consent of both parties, and mage-melding was one of them.

"You should let him, Illyana," Kitty Pryde whispered to her friend, creeping back to the edge of the bed. She'd gotten hold of a fluffy, shapeless blue robe which she had pulled tight over her rather flimsy nightgown, but she still flamed red every time her eyes skittered anywhere near Loki. "Professor Loki knows how to do _everything."_

Illyana looked from one of them to the other, then nodded and closed her eyes. "Okay," she said in a tiny voice.

Loki centered herself, leaving one hand on Illyana's forehead and resting the other over the girl's heart, and closed her eyes in turn. It had been a long time since she had attempted to commune with another mage, let alone one so unpracticed that they could not hold up their end of the bond - but in a way, that made it easier, that she did not have to work around another magic-user's defenses. She breathed in deeply through her nose, closed her own eyes, and pushed her magic out to touch the girl's.

"Mama," Illyana murmured, and went quiet.

The image flashed up before her mind's eye immediately. For a dizzying moment Loki was reminded of flying over the streets of New York, craggy buildings looming above a yawning drop. Except here the buildings were wreathed in yellow fire, a hellish glow emanating from each window, and the ground below was lost in darkness. Loki was not even sure there _was_ an end to that drop, and the sensation of vertigo made her stomach wrench in unpleasant memory. Chittering whispers clamored up from the darkness below, and the hot breeze stank of sulphur.

Loki was no true _spaemadr_ , as Charles Xavier was, but this was easy enough for anyone remotely sensitive to see; the girl's magic still held the shape of her terror. No wonder Illyana could not put it out of her mind, when the image had come halfway to creation before being stopped. She began with a simple charm to calm and lull her, feeling the miserable knot of tension slowly unclench beneath her hands. Then, when she thought Illyana had relaxed enough, she hit the image with a burst of concentrated magic, shattering it and dispersing it to the nether.

Illyana gasped, her eyes flying open. "It's gone!" she exclaimed. "You made it stop -"

"Hush," Loki said, pushing her gently back against the coverlet when she would have risen. "I'm not finished just yet. Be still."

Because there was something off about this child's magic, something _wrong_ that Loki could still sense. Magic was an intrinsic part of a sorcerer's soul; it came out of their life-force and grew as their body grew. Those who were attuned to magic could perceive the forms of other sorcerers as they projected into the astral plane. But the shape of Illyana's aura was _wrong,_ distorted and stretched in a way that did not match what Loki's mundane eyes saw.

Illyana's body was that of a child, but the shape of her magic was that of a woman full-grown, too tall and shapely to belong to this spindly pre-adolescent. It was strong, too, in a way that no child should be strong - the power of a fully-grown sorcerer attached to the mind of a fledgeling. There was something else wrong with it, too, something that Loki could not make out - something tainted and unpleasant about the edges of the astral form. She dearly wished she had one of Asgard's soulforges here so that she could inspect the girl properly and pinpoint the source of the corruption.

But worst of all, the young girl's aura was _incomplete -_ it followed her body up to her neck, and then suddenly stopped as though severed with a blade. There was a barrier here, some blockage that cut off the mind from the magic; with the circuit left incomplete in this way, she would not be able to access nor control her powers. The unbalanced, _unnaturalness_ of the shape made Loki's stomach roll, and he had a sudden horrible suspicion as to what might be interfering with Illyana's magic.

Or rather, _who._

"Child," Loki said, doing her best to keep her voice low and soothing. "Do you remember if you were ever able to use magic? When you wanted to, not just by accident?"

Illyana hesitated, then nodded timidly. "Back - back on the farm... in Balkai," she said. "I could - I could do things that nobody else could. I could make lights in the air, and make my dolls dance. I always used to make Mikhail and Piotr laugh, even when nothing else could."

Loki felt an uneasy twinge of nostalgia - bitter as nausea - when she remembered her own childhood idyll, telling stories to Thor and drawing illusions to go along with them. She pushed it sharply away. "When did you stop being able to control your powers?" she asked.

Illyana shrugged slightly. "When we came to America," she said. "Piotr brought me to this school - he said we would be safe here, that no one would hurt us here. He said I would make friends and I did, I _do_ like it here - but -"

"But?" Loki prompted her when she stumbled into silence.

Illyana's eyes filled up rapidly with tears. "But then I had my bad day," she whispered. "Piotr took me to see Professor X, and he touched my head and then I could speak English. And... and then the next day I woke up and my head hurt, and... the magic wouldn't do what I say any more. Not during the day, anyway. But when I sleep, I always get nightmares, and the magic comes back."

"I see."

Oh yes, Loki saw.

Carefully, lightly, Loki disengaged her magic from Illyana's, but not before strengthening her charm for calm and sleepiness. She stood up and straightened the coverlets on the bed, drawing the sheets over Illyana. "Sleep now, with no more of these haunts," she murmured to Illyana, drawing the sheets up to her collarbone. She rested a cool hand on Illyana's forehead for a moment before pulling away.

Glancing up, she met the fascinated gazes of Illyana's dorm-mates, and narrowed her gaze to something that sent them scattering. "Get this room cleaned up," she ordered, "and then go back to bed, all of you. In case you had forgotten, you still have class tomorrow."

"But what about Illyana?" Kitty wanted to know. "Will she be okay?"

"Illyana will be fine," Loki said, and there was a glint in her eyes that kept anyone from questioning her. "Now, if you young ladies will pardon me, I'm going to see the headmaster. I believe I have an appointment."

* * *

It was well after midnight, but Charles was still up; he was taking a days-end report from Ororo in California, who was of course several hours behind. They had been discussing the rumor of anti-mutant demonstrations in Orange County, and whether a spell of bad weather would be enough to disperse it (in Charles' experience, Californians were willing to call off pretty much anything on account of rain, seeing as they got so little of it.)

Due to the scattered nature of Loki's thoughts, Charles could always sense him before he entered a room - but tonight, he caught wind of Loki before he even entered the _building._ He was like a thunderstorm all in himself, a dark roiling cloud of anger and frustration with cold icy thoughts whipped here and about in agitation. Charles broke off the conversation with Ororo, apologizing as he did, and turned to await the coming of his strange Jotun protege. It was unusually late for a therapy session, but Loki was so clearly upset - although Charles could not determine why - that he didn't think it would be wise to wait.

"Is something on your mind, Loki?" Charles said mildly, when Loki burst into his office without knocking.

"How _dare_ you?" Loki said to him.

Well. That he had _not_ expected. Xavier's eyes widened, then narrowed as he sifted Loki's mind to find out what was going on. Loki's thoughts crackled with barely contained emotion - hurt and fury and just a hint of anxious fear lacing the edges - and it was almost painful to dive among them, to relive flashes of this evening's memories through Loki's mind.

Illyana. _Oh._ Xavier couldn't contain a wince. He had not wanted Loki and Illyana to meet, at least not so soon - had not wanted to show Loki such testimony of where he had fallen so woefully short in his efforts to protect and to heal.

"What gives you the right to commit this - this abomination? She who came to you for help - she who _trusted_ you!" Loki shouted. _As I trusted you._ "To tamper with a child's mind - to hobble her natural life-force so that you need not fear her power? You claim to stand against those who hate and fear what is different - but then you do this, you would cripple her innate talents for your own convenience?"

"Loki, please calm down," Xavier said.

"Why should I? How can I?" Loki said savagely. "You desecrated her very memories - why? To cover up your sabotage, so that she would not think to question you? So that she would remain your loyal, your obedient puppet? I thought you were more than this, I thought you were _better_ -"

"Loki, sit down."

"I do not jump to your command, Xavier! I am not one of your lackeys," Loki said, his eyes flashing. As he so often did when his emotions became too much for him to contain, he began to pace the well-worn groove in Xavier's office floor. "Is this whole - school, this entire mutant training project, only a facade, and excuse for you to build up your own empire? Do you farm these children for their talent, groom them to become your henchmen and wreak your will upon the world? Are they no more than _pawns_ in your grand design?"

"Loki - " Charles tried once more to get a word in. Despite the promise of violent power crackling at Loki's fingertips, Charles wasn't particularly afraid - at least not of Loki. Beneath Loki's feeling of betrayed fury, he could sense that Loki _wanted_ to be answered; under his anger lay the desperate hope that Charles would be able to explain the situation in a way that made sense, that did not render Charles just the latest in a long string of predatory kings in his life who sought to twist and manipulate those in his power. Loki had come here tonight not because he was angry at Charles and wanted to hurt him, but because he wanted desperately to be reassured.

Which Charles would be _glad_ to do, if Loki ever let him talk.

"Do these children even come to you willingly, or do you steal them - just like Odin?" _Like he stole me,_ his thoughts whispered. Loki still projected his own feelings intensely when he was upset, Charles noted; the longer his tirade went on, the less about Illyana this became at all. "What gives you the right, _what gives you the right -"_

"Loki!" Charles said sharply. "If I could stand face to face with you and hurl accusations and arguments back and forth all day, I would. But I can't. So please sit down, and let's talk."

Loki looked at him, wide-eyed and stunned from the force of his interruption, a bit shocked at the forceful reminder of Charles' own limitations. After a long moment of hesitation, he sank down into the chair. As Charles had hoped, the associations calmed him somewhat, now that he had had a chance to give vent to some of the torrent of conflict inside him.

"Thank you," Charles said when Loki had settled in. "Now - have you said all that you needed to say?" He was pretty sure Loki had - the rest of it was just elaborations on the same themes - but it couldn't hurt to make sure Loki knew that he was heard.

"...yes," Loki muttered.

"All right," Charles sighed. "Loki, listen to me. Do not mistake me - I don't pretend to be a saint. I am responsible for many, many people, and in this dirty world I am sometimes obliged to play by dirty rules. At the end of the day it is far more important to win than to cling to principle, because winning means survival.

"But I have never and _will_ never betray one of my students for my own self-interest, or let them be hurt for my own convenience, or go against their interests out of fear," he told Loki emphatically, leaning forward to punctuate the words. " _Never."_

"But - the girl-" Loki protested, though some of the wind had been taken out of his sails.. "Illyana..."

Charles shook his head. "Believe me, it gave me no joy to alter her memory," he said. "It's a repugnant thing for any telepath to do, myself included. But let me explain.

"When Illyana and her brother Piotr came to this country from Russia, they were being hunted," Charles began. The exact details of who had been hunting them and why was a longer story that he didn't intend to get into right now. "Her brother brought her here looking for sanctuary, but they were followed even here. Illyana was attacked by a force none of us could sense or counter - one that severed her soul from her body and pulled it into a separate dimension.

"Although only minutes passed here before we were able to break the connection, years passed in the dimension where Illyana's soul was trapped and abused. I am no expert on magic myself; I do not know how they kept her there, or even fully understand why. Her captors wanted her for her magic, and while they had her, they... fed on it?" Charles hesitated, then shook his head. "I don't have the right words. Exploited her for it, certainly, in a process that was both painful and corrupting.

"In that other realm, her soul aged to that of a teenager. When she returned to her nine-year-old body, the shock of suddenly reverting in age plus the trauma she had experienced was too much - she lost her mind." Charles' expression tightened painfully, remembering it. "She was completely incoherent and irrational; she did not even recognize her own brother. She was terrified - we could not comfort her or reason with her - and lashed out around her with magic far stronger than anything she'd displayed as a child; as powerful as an adult's, but mad and wild with hatred. She was a danger to herself and to everyone around her. I _had_ to do something, for her own safety and for that of the school."

Charles paused a moment, brooding on past memories. It was a year and a half ago now, but it still stung. "I was unable to fix the damage to her magic - I did not even know where to begin," he admitted. "I searched for healing for her, but found none who could and would help; magic users are rare on Earth, and even rarer among our allies. In the end, all I could do for her was put a mental block on her powers and suppress her memories of the time she was stolen."

Loki frowned, his face dark and thunderous. "You thought it wiser to leave her so damaged, but with no understanding of _why?"_ he demanded.

If anyone would know how badly it would shake one's sense of self, to have such scars on his mind but no understanding of how they had come to be there, Loki would - his wounding at the hands of the Mad Titan had hurt him in very similar ways. Which was doubtless why he was so angry on Illyana's behalf. Still, the situations were not the same - Loki had been full-grown and incredibly strong-minded, but Illyana had not been. "I saw some of her memories of her captivity," Charles replied. "They are horrors that no one should have to endure - no one, and especially not a child.

"It is my hope that when she is older - when the age of her body matches that of her spirit - she will be able to deal with the memory of what happened to her. But until then, it's kinder that she forget."

"Kinder, perhaps - but better?" Loki argued. "I - can see your reasoning as to her memories. But you can't just leave her magic like this until she comes of age. Magic is a living thing, connected to the life-force of the user. It cannot be suppressed forever. Already it is creeping out around the edges. If you truly fear for the safety of herself and her students, you must teach her control, not force control upon her!"

Charles sighed. "I would like to, Loki, but I can't teach her myself," he said. "I don't know enough about magic. I have long looked for a suitable teacher for her but never found one. Magic users are rare on Earth, and none of them number among our allies. I have no sorcerers I can call upon for help."

"You have me!" Loki protested.

Charles paused, looking at Loki for a long moment, until the Asgardian began to fidget in his chair. In truth, the thought of asking Loki to help tutor Illyana - as well as a few other students who had shown an affinity for magic - had crossed his mind in the past. But he hadn't intended to bring Loki and Illyana into contact so soon - for various reasons, starting but not ending with the fact that they were both very damaged. Illyana's past traumas could make her difficult to be around, and Loki was not always a patient teacher, nor kind.

It would also be extremely hard for anyone else at the school to oversee their sessions, since most of it would take place out of the perception of any of the other teachers and most of the students. And Illyana was vulnerable, and Loki was - not without ambition, Charles knew. If Loki choose to try to enthrall the girl for reasons of his own, there would be little anyone could do to stop him.

Still, if the alternative was allowing Illyana's powers to run rampant, hurting herself and her classmates... it was not, truly, a difficult choice.

"All right," Charles allowed. When Loki sat up straight, expression lighting up, Charles raised a hand in warning. "I will not lift the block from her powers completely, at least not at first - I _will not_ put the other students at risk. But I'll try to scale it back, enough that you and she can work together to learn control over it. You can start on Monday."

"Fine," Loki said. Abruptly he rose from his chair and bowed, a relic of his Asgardian manners that betrayed his agitation. "If that's settled, then, I will bid you a fair evening. As I mentioned to the students, tomorrow is another busy day."

"Good night to you, too," Charles said. As Loki turned to the door, he added, "And Loki - thank you."

Loki paused with one hand on the knob. "...Whatever for?" he said warily, glancing over his shoulder.

"You cared enough about your students that you were willing to defy me for their sake," Charles said simply. "I can't tell you how much that means to me. I don't claim to be perfect, Loki, and sometimes I make mistakes. I would rather that my students... that my _allies_ call me on them - before things go too wrong."

Loki turned to look at him, then looked away quickly, as though embarrassed. "Good night, Charles Xavier," he said more quietly, and let himself out the door.

* * *

Loki walked across the darkened campus to his apartment, thoughts consumed by turmoil. If nothing else, tonight's events had made clear to him that even though Xavier was _capable_ of seeing all the minds of all the people in his care, he did not routinely do so - else the girl's nightmares could not have caught him so by surprise.

The molten heat of his fury had died down, but what was left in the cinders was cold calculation. He had been appeased as to the rightness of Xavier's heart, but remained unconvinced as to the wisdom of his tactics. His eyes had been cleared of the fog of adoration; Xavier was _not_ perfect, and his decisions were _not_ always automatically right.

The problem was, as it ever was, that Xavier was too damn softhearted. He claimed he would not cling to principle if it meant failure and destruction for his people, and yet he insisted on holding fast to principle every day that he continued in this benighted three-way standoff with the human government and his mutant rivals. Xavier - with the power of his students and allies behind them - had the power to reach out and _take_ the peace they needed. But he would not.

And the longer he dawdled in this impotent stalemate, the more deadly their enemies grew. Loki had not forgotten Beast's grim reports of anti-mutant Sentinels seeking out and destroying helpless mutants, nor Xavier's picture of the over-zealous Erik Lensherr, bent on eradicating all who opposed him. Xavier was a fool to try to interpose himself between them; he could not take the high road forever. Eventually, one or another of his enemies would get lucky.

Well, if Xavier could not be counted on to act on his interests, then someone else would simply have to look after those interests _for_ him. Loki had watched Odin All-Father at statecraft long enough to know that there must always be at least one trusted armsman, one retainer who was willing to do the tasks that the king could not, willing and able to do the dirty work. Someone always had to be the bad guy - and who was better suited to it than he?

As ever, in the end, Loki would do what Loki thought best.

* * *

~tbc...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As with Kurt, I would like to emphasize that I am making little to no claim of staying true to Illyana/Magik's comics canon. Given that her full Marvel backstory involves her being kidnapped to an alternate dimension at six years of age, spending ten years there being taught white magic by alternate-universe Storm and Kitty, manifesting a sexy evil alternate personality, having part of her soul stored in stones for later convenient death-and-resurrection, coming back ten years older seconds after she left, then later going into the past to try to kill her six-year-old self only at the last minute changing her mind and deciding to save her instead, thus reverting from her teenage self to her child self on the spot as a result of having changed the timelines, dying, being resurrected as her sexy evil alternate personality, getting apprenticed to the Beyonder, killing off the rest of the team, un-killing the rest of the team, becoming the queen of a Hell-dimension, giving up being queen of said Hell-dimension, and at this point I'm not even halfway through her marvel.wikia biography, I've decided that comics canon is too goddamn complicated to try to incorporate into a story that is not specifically about that character. Instead, I have attempted to hit the high notes of her backstory while keeping it at least marginally consistent with the rest of the universe.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The prodigal son returns.

 

Mystique kept up her assumed form until she reached New York City; there she shed the guise of the stocky, middle-aged gardener and switched instead to a bland, dark-haired businessman The subway terminal was chaotic enough that no one noticed the change, and she was able to melt into the crowd as just one more of a thousand, ten thousand commuters hurrying about their day. All of them so wrapped up in their pointless little lives, their narrow little worlds; all of them too blind and closed-minded to even look around them. She walked among them, but she was not _of_ them - and while once that thought might have filled her with fear and shame, now she felt only triumph.

One day, mankind would know their betters. One day, she would never have to wear any human skin. For now she still had to, but it was out of duty and devotion, not out of humble anxiety to please. It was not the camouflage of the prey that cowered, but the stealth of the predator that stalked. She was the wolf among the sheep, and none of the poor little lambs saw her comings and goings at all.

She changed forms several more times as she made her journey: from New York City down out through Newark, down across the New York border into Pennsylvania. She stuck with the public train system as far it would take her, and when that ran out, she shifted into a beautiful blond bombshell and hitchhiked out on Route 80. When the thick-neck, sunburned trucker who stopped to pick her up got a little too wandering in the hands, she smashed his face into the steering column, threw him out the door of the moving truck, and took over the wheel herself.

By the time the sun made long shadows across the Allegheny mountains ahead of her, she had reached the remote abandoned farmstead that the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants was using as a headquarters. _Now_ abandoned, she thought with a smirk, as she drove up her purloined truck to park beside the other vehicles in the dusty barnlot. As she climbed down from the cab of the truck, she felt a great relief as she shifted back into her native skin at last.

"I'm back," she announced as she stepped in the doorway; a few of the lurking shadows in the corner of the farmhouse snapped to attention when the door creaked, then relaxed as she came into view. Mystique ran her eyes over each menacing figure as it loomed out of the shadows, identifying her brethren; Mortimor Toynbee, that suckup known as The Toad, and Jamie Madrox, although for a change there was only one of the Multiple Man visible. There was no sign of Mastermind or Pyro; most likely they were out on missions of their own.

Only one figure had not jumped to attention when Mystique came in, and as usual her attention snapped to him, letting the others fall by the wayside. Erik Lensherr, also known as Magneto, the greatest and most powerful mutant of their generation. His silvering hair and cool demeanor, as always, lent a feeling of centering and calm to Mystique's seething roil. "Welcome home," Magneto said calmly.

He put aside his current work - a tablet and a large map of Washington that he'd been poring over - and looked up at Mystique expectantly, his hands folding in front of him. "What did you find at the school?" he asked, and Mystique's pulse beat a little faster at the weight of his expectation - the desire not to disappoint. She felt like a lioness returning to the den, meeting the expectant weight of the pride leader's golden stare, waiting for her to display her kills.

Fortunately, she had plenty of spoils to share. She reached into her jacket - her real jacket, skin-tight and hidden from sight under all of her disguises - and extracted a wad of flimsy papers wrapped around wafer-thin flash drives. "Potential," she said. "There's a new group of students at the school, and a few of them would make very good recruits - here are their profiles."

She peeled the layers of paper open and handed Magneto the memory cards; he set them aside for later. Mystique unfolded and flattened the papers she'd brought onto the table, where Magneto bent his head over them. "This one is especially interesting," she said, pointing out a doe-eyed teenage girl with a cloud of fuzzy dark hair in the corner of the picture. "Rumor has it that she's being groomed for the next X-Men slot, so I've been taking note of any potential weaknesses. It's all in my report."

"Mm-hmm," Magneto said, absently leafing through the sheets of paper. Mystique continued with her report, now more into generalities than specifics.

"Anti-mutant violence is on the rise on the West Coast, as we know," she said, "and most of the X-Men have been sent to try to help deal with it. When I left the school Storm, Cyclops, Wolverine, Iceman, and Havok were all confirmed to be in the field. Jean Gray is in the capital again, attending another round of Senate hearings, and Angel is doing spin doctoring in New York. The campus itself is mostly guarded by B-listers and _homo saps._ "

Magneto flicked his gaze up at her. "Would you say that now is a good time to make a move, then?" he asked. "Perhaps to retrieve some of those most promising children you identified."

Mystique shrugged. "It's your call," she said. "There's one other thing you should watch out for, though. There's some new teacher who appeared on the campus a few weeks ago. I haven't gotten a close up look at him, but he's apparently some kind of hotshot superpowered ambassador."

Magneto's silvery eyebrows climbed up his forehead. "An ambassador?" he asked. "For whom?"

She shook her head. "No idea," she said. "He's _not_ one of us, but not a _homo sap_ either. No one can agree on what he's doing there or what he's capable of, but the word is that he's some kind of interplanetary fugitive that Xavier is trying to court as an ally. He's a wild card. He -"

_"He is, in fact, here."_

Mystique shot to her feet and spun around, hands automatically rising in a combat position. The voice echoed confusingly from one place in the farmhouse from another, and she wasn't sure at first where to look. The next moment the shadows parted, and a tall slim figure materialized in the farmhouse door, silhouetted by the last of the sunlight. The shoulders were bulky and padded with armor, sharp edges and points filing down the silhouette to a long sweep of a heavy leather coat that trailed nearly to the ground. When he turned his head, the tall shape of horns protruding from his helmet cut shadows through the room.

The stranger stepped forward, and the dark shape resolved itself into a pale-skinned young man in an imposing gold helmet. His features were as sharp as his armor and his eyes glinted green, hungry and watchful. His armor seemed to be of heavy dark leather or fabric, green and black panels broken up here and there with sharp metal accents. His hands were gloved, leaving his face the only part of his skin vulnerable to the air.

"What are you doing here?" Mystique demanded. "How did you find this place?"

The stranger smiled at her, and she felt an uneasy prickle down her spine at the sight of it. That was a velociraptor's smile, with too many teeth that went far too high up in his face. "I followed you, of course," he said, in a soft, nearly purring voice that radiated menace. "You led me right to this doorstep."

"What?" Mystique felt her skin flush hot, then cold with shock and disbelief. "That shouldn't be possible?"

He took a menacing step towards her. "Do you honestly think that just because you don't look like yourself, that you are invisible?" he demanded. "You were very easy to follow - for anyone who knows what they're looking for."

Mystique spotted a movement in the high corner of her eye, and leapt back just as Toad's long prehensile tongue lashed out towards the intruder. Once Toad had grabbed him, and lifted him into the air, he would be easy to trap and subdue - but the man dodged to the side as quick as lightning, a divot of wood and splinters going flying as the tongue struck the floor where he had been.

"Ooh, a swing and a miss,:" the stranger said. "Care to try again?"

That was enough for her; she leapt forward, reached out to grab his ridiculous flowing coat for a handhold so she could deliver a few solid kicks to his pointy head. He watched her approach without moving, but Mystique suddenly found herself stumbling forward, tripping off-balance as she grabbed no more than air.

A laugh sounded from the far corner of the room, and the stranger stepped forward again - now without the helmet, his stark white face framed by long dark hair as he smiled at her mockingly. "Close, but no cigar," he said with a smirk.

Jamie stood up from his post at Magneto's elbow and began to move about the room, copies of him spreading out like a time-lapse photograph. The stranger watched his progress for a few moments with that damned mocking smile still on his lips - and then copies of himself began to flicker into being all around the room, one of them for each copy of the Multiple Man. Mystique hovered, looking from one of them to the next, her arms tense and ready to strike but unsure where.

"Enough." Magneto stood up, pushing his chair back with a splintering scrape. He raised his hand, and all of the illusive copies flickered out of existence as the stranger was caught by his magnetic power. The armor - whatever it was made of - was not metal, but there were enough buckles and braces and protrusions to let Magneto lift him effortlessly from the ground, suspend him a good meter in the air and far from any support or bracing.

The stranger gave a breathless laugh, like this was the best trick he'd seen at a county fair - and then he made a fluid gesture with his hands, one crossing over the other and fingers flicking out to the side. The sheen of metal in his costume altered subtly in the dim light, and slowly his feet settled to the ground again. Mystique moved forward, ready to take him out, but Magneto halted her with one upraised palm.

"Impressive," Magneto said, his eyes narrowing suspiciously on the visitor. "There's not many who can do that. What are you?"

"Special," the man replied smugly.

"You're not human," Magneto continued. "Are you a mutant?"

"Well, the jury's still out on that," the stranger said.

Magneto frowned. "Who are you? What do you mean by such a display?"

Impossibly, his sharklike smile widened further. "I am Loki, God of Mischief, and I've come to aid you." He bowed floridly.

Silence lingered in the farmhouse for a long moment, stunned by the chutzpah of that introduction. It was Magneto who moved to break it at last. "Gods have never been any particular use to my people that I've seen," he remarked.

"Well, then," Loki suggested, "they have much to make up for do they not?"

"Wait," Mystique interrupted him, staring hard at Loki's profile. That profile, those horns, that melodic way of speaking - "Wait. I've seen you before. Weren't you the maniac who showed up in Stuttgart and demanded that the crowd kneel to him?"

Loki inclined his head. "My early days on Midgard," he said. "A small show of my abilities, from one power to another. I believe our interests could lie together. I have come to realize that _your_ people are great in power and potential, and I wish to help you realize it."

Magneto stirred. "Strange how the years go by and yet so little changes," he mused, running his fingers along the edge of the table, not looking directly at Loki. "I remember the last time a man stood before a crowd in Germany and gave speeches about the ecstasy of subjugation. I remember how words were turned on their heads, when slavery meant freedom, and purity meant death."

He raised his gaze to meet Loki's, and his eyes were flat with rage and disgust. "I have no interest in allying with a fascist would-be conquistador," he spat. "You've made it clear in what regard you view my planet and my people, and I will not shake hands with the likes of you."

Loki's tongue darted out to wet his lips, the only outward sign of his nervousness. "Ah... perhaps I should clarify," he hedged. "I am not the same man that you saw in Stuttgart; I have reformed. I've seen the light, and excised all of the noxious ideology from my soul."

"Really," Magneto drawled with great skepticism. "And what triggered this sudden change of heart?"

"Charles Xavier," Loki answered with a wry twist of his lips.

Unexpectedly, Magneto laughed. "Yes, dear Charles does have that effect on people," he said, rich fondness coloring his tone.

Loki went on, encouraged by the easy acceptance in Magneto's tone. "I no longer seek to slaughter or conquer," he said. "But I am quite concerned about the current state of mutant affairs."

Mystique couldn't help but scoff. "And what could _you_ possibly know of our affairs?" she demanded.

Loki's eyes flickered to her, although he did not turn away from Magneto. "I know what it is to be hated and feared for the talents that set you apart... set you above," he said. He took a step forward, and as he did so his coloring shifted dramatically. Pale skin turned suddenly to night-blue, green eyes bled scarlet, and a breath of cold air smelling like frost flooded the room. "If I am not your brother by blood, I certainly have been made so by trials of fire - I too have betrayed, have been cast out to the fringes. I see in mutants my own reflection, and I seek to advance them as I would myself."

Mystique stared, mouth dropping open in shock at the radical shift in his appearance. "I see a corrupt government that exploits and makes war upon the most gifted and valuable of its people," Loki continued, "I see a populace that cowers in animalistic terror and lashes out like bitter beasts against the future that they fear. I see brother fighting against brother and I do not care for it. I would help you put an end to it, so that your people never again have to hide."

"A noble goal," Magneto said noncommittally. "Why come to me? Why not bring this grand vision to Charles?"

Loki shook his head, glaring off into a point in the middle distance. "Because Xavier, for all his high ideals, will never be able to do it," he spat in frustration. "He has a good heart, but sentiment makes him weak. He truly believes that he can transform the world into a utopia merely by thinking about it hard enough."

He returned his gaze to Magneto, intent and focused. " Wishes do not transform a world; actions do," he said. "You are a man of actions. I can respect that. I can help you make the world you desire come to pass.

"And what do you get out of this?" Magneto challenged.

Loki pursed his lips, and began to walk slowly across the wooden planking. "Imagine it, if you will: a realm of two kingdoms," he said, his voice measured and persuasive. "One, a kingdom of mutants, the future of mankind, a flourishing kingdom of arts and beauty, where Homo Superior practices their art, studies, and constructs a bridge to the stars."

His wanderings had brought him around to Magneto's side, and he spoke his final words almost directly in the old mutant's ears. "Free, proud, and unafraid. Protected. Healthy. Flourishing. _Yours."_

He took a step back, and resumed his pacing around the room. "The other... the kingdom of mortals. Ruled over with a firm but just hand, schooled as children are schooled to keep them in line and no threat to others. Never again allowed to presume themselves upon their betters." His voice, and his words, quickened with excitement. "Contained, pacified, submissive."

He wheeled to face them, arms outstretched as he smiled in triumph. " _Mine."_

She could almost see it - the world he was describing. Could almost _taste_ it, it hung in the air so clearly between them. A utopia, a promised land of mutants - all of Erik's visions, come to pass, and those troublesome mortals kept shut away where they could never hurt her again, never hurt anyone again. The possibility of it took her breath away, and she suddenly found herself silently urging Magneto to agree, to say yes, to make the dream into reality.

Magneto, however, remained cool and skeptical. "You allot yourself a generous portion of this new world," he observed. "The humans outnumber my people by a thousand to one."

Loki smiled wryly. "I can't imagine you'd really want to manage them yourself; they're an unbearably tedious lot, don't you think?" he said reasonably. "Besides, your kingdom would gradually increase, as humanity advances, while mine would gradually decrease."

"Why would there need to be a _kingdom_ at all?" a grating voice cut into the conversation; Toad, still watching the whole byplay from his corner in the ceiling. "What makes you think we don't just want all the humans dead?"

Loki smiled, almost seemed to chuckle soundlessly. "Simple logic," he said. "I am told that most mutants alive today were born to mortal parents. It therefore follows that the mortals are the parents of mutants yet unborn, and you would not risk them. Am I wrong?"

Mystique bridled at the implication that humans still had anything over them - but Magneto waved one hand in acknowledgement of a point made, so she subsided. "You're not wrong," Magneto said. "It's a generous offer, it's true. I can't help but be flattered. Yet... I can't help but wonder just how you plan to bring about this ambitious plan to reality."

"You have so little faith in me," Loki replied.

"Who needs faith when I have the evidence of my own eyes?" Magneto countered. "I have not forgotten just what a disaster your last grand scheme turned out to be. Remind me, what became of your last allies, that filthy alien refuse that you brought to our shores,"

"The Chitauri." Loki's expression when he said the name was remarkably blank and closed, even for him.

Magneto grimaced. "Yes. Them. The landfills of Manhattan are groaning with their corpses; the warehouses are stuffed to the brim with the scrap of their shattered machines. And the Earth remains demonstrably un-conquered."

"Ah, but what makes you think that wasn't my goal all along?" Loki said with a sly grin. "To play one side off against the other, and myself escape the melee unscathed, and with this realm protected."

Mystique rolled her eyes and heard Jamie scoff at this unbelievably flimsy excuse, but Magneto's face stayed neutral as he merely shrugged. "Perhaps," he said. "However. The way I see it, there are only two possibilities at play: either you are incompetent, or you are unreliable.

"Either way, no amount of pretty promises are enough to make an alliance with you worth the nuisance of your inevitable betrayal." He turned to face Loki square-on, his arms folded across his chest and his expression stern and forbidding. "The answer is no. I will not play your game."

For a long, tense moment the players stayed locked in their tableau; Mystique watched Loki like a hawk, looking for the best angle to attack. If he made one move towards Magneto - if he even dared _breathe_ in his direction - she would break his neck with her bare hands, God or not.

"Very well," Loki said at last, turning away with a disinterested shrug. He walked towards the door, his pace confident and unhurried. "Your own loss. Well, the offer will remain open - for a short time only. Until then..." He glanced briefly over his shoulder, and gave them a smile alight with the promise of blood and mayhem. "...You know where to find me."

The door fell heavily closed behind him, cutting off the last of the light. Mystique shook herself loose from the near-trance and darted over to wrench it open again; although she could have been only seconds behind him, Loki was nowhere to be seen.

Magneto's voice behind her filled the silence with a mellifluous, almost poetic cadence: "...And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time." He turned away from the open door, shaking his head as he glanced around at the other members of the Brotherhood. "We'll have to keep an eye on that young man. He could cause a great deal of trouble."

"For us, or for the other guys?" Jamie wanted to know. "Or for the humans?" Magneto shot him a small, sharp smile.

"Any of the above," he replied, "or all."

* * *

Loki had certain advantages when it came to traveling that others did not, but it was still past full dark by the time he got back to North Salem. He slipped unseen through the darkened campus - being late on a school night, it was already quiet and peaceful - and let himself into his shadowed apartment, deep in thought.

Magneto had rejected his offer of alliance. That had not been expected. But the trip hadn't been a complete waste, after all. He'd managed to plant some suggestions among the less mentally shielded members of the troupe, and more importantly, a tracer signature. It wouldn't allow him to track them over long distances, but he'd be alerted any time any of the so-called 'Brotherhood of Mutants' were in the vicinity. He'd also used a bit of sleight-of-hand to make a few key changes on Mystique's reports. Nothing too obvious - that would alert them that their information had been changed, and was useless now - but enough throw them off. The sheet of information now stated erroneously that Kitty Pryde lost her phasing ability when exposed to water, which should cause some unpleasant surprises to anyone who tried to face her later in battle.

Still, he'd lost some ground today. Perhaps he should have spent longer setting the scene before he made his offer to Magneto, established a reputation that would impress the likes of Erik Lensherr. Perhaps he should have -

With an absent, practiced snap of his fingers Loki turned on the lights in his apartment - and then froze, because he was not alone.

Charles Xavier sat on the mostly-untouched sofa in his living room, facing the door. His usual wheeled-chair like device was nowhere to be seen, and for a moment Loki was struck with a sense of extreme disorientation at seeing him so out of place. He had seen Charles so many times in his study, behind his grand and imposing mahogany desk, that he had come to think of Charles and the study room as a single entity.

"I was not sure you were going to return tonight," Charles said, his voice carefully neutral and his face blank.

"I, ah," Loki said, momentarily abashed and at a loss for words - for lies. He felt a flush creeping up the back of his neck and fought to keep it out of his face, feeling like a youth who had been caught sneaking back before dawn from a night spent out on the town. "I was not sure either. I hope you weren't sitting up for me."

Charles' expression did not change. "It's Tuesday," he pointed out as though Loki had forgotten. "You left your defense class halfway through, much to the relief of your students. And you were missed by Hank and Anne-Marie at lunch, and Illyana in your afternoon session with her. That last was what surprised me the most."

Loki couldn't help but cringe, feeling pangs of guilt begin to bite ant-like at his conscience. He attempted to shake it off; he, Loki Skywalker, was not one to be bound by petty class schedules or _coffee dates._ "I was called away by an errand of vital necessity, which came up quite suddenly," he excused himself.

"And this errand could not wait for you to make arrangements or explanations?"

"No." Loki had been watching the shapeshifter for some time now, waiting for her to make a move. When she abandoned her pretense of a simple servant and headed south, Loki had dropped his daily routine to disguise himself in turn and tail her.

Charles gave him a hard look, and Loki felt the stinging guilt bubble up around him stronger than ever, mixed with a sense of deep anxiety - did Charles know where he'd gone? Was he angry? Did he think Loki to have betrayed him? Would Charles turn on him now, just like all the others did, the moment he stepped out of line, even when he was _doing it for them -_

He felt the warm, buzzing sensation of the mortal's _seidr_ moving over his, and then Charles heaved a large sigh and rubbed one hand over his face. Most of the tension had gone out of his face, and what was left behind spoke of fatigue - and exasperation.

"Loki, did you even have a plan in mind, when you went to see Erik and pretended to ally with him?" the professor asked, his voice reproving - but also kind, still kind. "Or were you just planning to play it by ear?"

Loki felt a great warm swell of relief overtake him, and the cold anxiety loosened its grip on his throat. He knew, _he knew_ and he wasn't angry. He managed a loose, casual shrug. "It really depended on how the initial meeting went," he said. "If he had accepted me as a true ally - at the very least you would have had a man on the inside, to feed false information to them and truth to you.

"At best, possibly I could have pulled him out of position, set him up in an ambush in a place where he would have no power." That was what he had done to Laufey, bringing him out of his kingdom of ice where he commanded the very earth and sky around him - bringing him to warm Asgard, where he would have no more than the ice he could carry on his body to defend himself. (Like he had tried to do to _Him,_ lover of death, lure him out with the promise of heroes to battle, separate him from his empires and his armies and his wards and his spells and bring him low.) Magneto's power was over metal; if Loki could have brought him to a place of nature, of wood and water where metal held no sway... well. Then many things would become possible.

But that was all a daydream now. "I did not truly expect him to say no," Loki admitted. He frowned. "Very few ever have, before. It's actually kind of insulting."

Charles gave him a sharp look. "Erik is old and canny, and he has many layers of defenses," he said vaguely, then shook his head with a sigh. "Well, things went about as I expected; at least you're back safely, no harm done."

He _cared_ that Loki returned safely. Loki turned away to try to hide his expression, feeling the warm wave rise further up in him at Charles' words. To all appearances Loki had betrayed him - scorned his hospitality and welcome and gone to break bread with the enemy, and all Charles cared about was that _Loki_ was all right.

He hadn't assumed the worst. He didn't think that Loki had reverted back to his old ways - _his base nature -_ and returned to villainy. Anyone else could have - anyone else _would_ have, everyone else _had,_ every time before - but at last he had _someone_ who gave him the benefit of the doubt. At last _someone_ actually took the time to find out what his true motivations would be, and took that into consideration when levying punishment.

"I," Loki said, and swallowed hard. The dangerous swell of sentiment threatened to lift words out of him that he wasn't ready to let loose, just yet. He groped instead for another confession, raw and ugly but not quite so personal.

"I, ah, I could have killed him then, you know," Loki said, turning back to face Charles with a thin veneer of casualness over his words. "I was right before him. A bolt of poison before he could defend... But I did not. I thought... I thought it would not please you."

Charles' expression did something very strange then, nearly crumpling in on itself with a mixture of shock and horror and grief. Loki stood, one hand unconsciously wringing the nervousness out of the other, as he awaited Charles' response: would he be disappointed? Angry that Loki had not taken the opportunity, angry that he had even considered it?

Truth be told, Loki was not entirely sure why he had not. He knew, both from his friends at the academy and from the mortal newscriers, that Magneto had killed many. That he would likely kill many more, if he was not stopped. To put an end to his reign of terror would save many lives - both mortal and, in all likelihood, mutant. Was that not the duty of a protector, then, to act in such a moment for the good of the entire world?

And yet he had hesitated, because something in him told him that Charles would not approve. That _heroes_ did not strike down old men unawares with poison, and that there was more to that than foolish sentiment or stupid self-righteous honor.

"...no," Charles said at last, his voice a little choked. "No, you were right. I'm glad you chose not to."

The choked sound of his voice told Loki that his mentor was having many of the same doubts as himself - yet how much heavier would they weigh upon the man who took the fate of all mutants and all Midgard upon his shoulders than upon Loki, who was well known to have naught in the way of conscience or remorse? How much harder would the choice be when it was between all the people he held in his care - and his oldest friend, the man he saw as a brother?

Was this the same love, the same grief, that _Thor_ felt which made the golden prince extend a hand in friendship, in brotherhood and redemption, even when Loki had fallen far past all hope of any of those things?

It was a sudden cold burst of clarity, a window into his sometimes-brother's thoughts, and Loki was not sure he liked the taste of it. When he was very young, Loki had imagined heroes the same way as Thor always had: great bright figures of purity and strength, warriors who slew monsters by the hundred. It was not until he'd grown older that Loki realized the truth: that the _real_ monsters were under the skins of everyday people, and that no amount of smiting in the world could exorcise them.

Loki had thought then that a true hero was one with the resolve and fortitude to do what had to be done - to find the greatest number of good for the greatest number of people. To serve one's country and one's people, no matter how grim the task, no matter how painful the necessity. Such was the lesson of true statesmanship that Odin had taught him, and the lessons that Loki had tried to apply to Jotunheim and to Midgard.

And after... then, after, Loki didn't know any more. There were still grim deeds to be done, but just doing them didn't make you a hero, he understood that now. For a while he had scorned that such things as 'heroes' even truly existed, but instead were self-righteous delusions that fools told themselves to avoid guilt for the things they had done - or failed to do.

Yet here was Charles Xavier - still grieving over Magneto, the beloved friend who waded knee-deep in blood. Yet here was Thor, who reached out to Loki time and time again despite all of the pain, all of the destruction that had gone between them. All the ugliness that the world could bring to bear, _had_ been brought to bear, and yet these two men - so very different, yet somehow fundamentally the same - still stayed true to the narrow path between compassion and ruthlessness.

Perhaps the _true_ mark of the hero was the one whose love ran so deep and so steadfast that even the harsh truths of necessity could not stain it?

If so, then Loki was truly stunned by the scope of it, humbled by the strength it took: to bear up a mountain and not be crushed by it. More than ever he was convinced that he, Loki, would never be a hero. But for the first time in many, many years, he allowed himself to believe that others could be.

"I'm glad you are back, Loki," Charles said, his voice somewhat calmer now that he'd regained his composure. "Please, do not leave without warning again, if you can help it."

He hadn't told Loki not to leave again - didn't even try to order him what to do and not to do, and that made the shame hang all the heavier on Loki's wrists. "I will try not to," he offered - the most guarantee he could extend.

Charles nodded, accepting the promise however conditional. "I suppose I should leave you to rest. It's been a long day, and you have a lecture to give in the morning, after all."

"Wait," Loki blurted out. The day's activities and the night's revelations had left him uneasy in his own space, loath to be alone with his thoughts. He had not eaten since breakfast this morning, and if he knew aught about Charles' own habits at all... "Will you... will you stay a bit? I can - you could dine with me."

_As friends do._

Loki had come to treasure the meals he shared with Hank, with Jean and Cecilia and the others; the Midgardian tradition of eating to pass the time in companionship was not one he was used to, from his formal and solitary life in Asgard. Still, he was unsure it was the proper protocol, to invite someone to a meal in his own apartment.

Charles' expression softened, some of the grief lines easing from it. "Of course," he said quietly.

Loki had certain advantages when it came to cooking that others did not, but he did not use them now even though he could have prepared the meal much faster with magic; he was showing off a little, truth be told, his new mastery of Midgardian cooking appliances. The simple meal was quickly prepared, the table set with Charles' willing aid, and the two of them sat down at Loki's dining room table before half an hour had passed. It was, Loki realized, the first time since he had moved into this apartment that he would not be eating here alone.

"So..." Charles said, toying with his silverware as the two of them ate. "Were they... how were they?"

"Erik," he elaborated when Loki sent him a questioning glance. He seemed oddly hesitant, almost afraid to speak - hungry for word of their well-being, but constrained in front of others from letting his concern be known. "And my sister."

Loki settled down in his chair, took a forkful of noodles and a deep breath, and began to tell him.

* * *

~tbc...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really wanted to title this chapter "The Temptation of Erik Lensherr," but thought that might give too much away.
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> Fair warning -- don't be misled by the speed of this chapter update. I had a very clear idea of what was going on in this chapter and was able to write it quickly, but the same is not true of the next few chapters. Not that I'm abandoning this fic or going on hiatus or anything like that, just don't expect new chapters every week!


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki attempts to mend some fences.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Author Advisory (please read;)**
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> This chapter involves some pretty in-depth discussion of religious themes from the point of view of a devout Catholic. If you are uncomfortable reading such things, either because you are not yourself religious or because you are, you may want to skip the second scene entirely. This chapter also involves discussion of self-harm in the form of cutting. I am not myself a cutter, so I sincerely apologize if I disrespect or offend any of my readers.
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> And lastly, possible (?) OOC'ness on the part of Nightcrawler/Kurt Wagner. The motives and actions described in this chapter are based on a perception of Nightcrawler's character I built almost entirely out of a three-sentence exchange in X-Men 2. Storm notices that Kurt has scars on his skin that seem to be self-inflicted and asks him about them. They have the following dialog:
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> Nightcrawler: They're angelic symbols, passed on to mankind by the archangel Gabriel.  
> Storm: They're beautiful. How many do you have?  
> Nightcrawler: One for every sin. So quite a few. 
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> The implication is first that Kurt is pretty religious, since most casual Christians wouldn't be able to recognize let alone reproduce angelic symbols, and secondly that Kurt cuts himself as a way to atone for sins, either real or perceived. This got me thinking about what sort of effect Kurt's very visible mutation would have on his spiritual life and vice versa. I really do not know how well this fits in with Nightcrawler's character in other versions of the X-Men canon, since as far as I know the self-scarification only ever appears in X2.
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> Also, I have absolutely no idea how religion and spirituality work in Marvel's Asgard. I just pulled that whole section out of my butt. Does it show?

Near the end of January, Piotr Rasputin - the mighty Colossus - returned (temporarily) from his missions in Arizona. Piotr was also the older brother of Illyana Rasputina, and he had approached Loki very coldly, suspiciously, at first. That lasted until he'd actually sat in with one of Loki and Illyana's lessons - Loki hadn't been pleased about that, but it was clear that he couldn't force Piotr out short of physically incapacitating him, and that was a battle he didn't intend to pick.

Once he witnessed the way Illyana was able to relax and open up, how under Loki's guidance she was able to use small magics again, Piotr's attitude reversed on the spot and he apparently now considered Loki one of his greatest shield-brothers. His effusive enthusiasm was annoying, but Colossus was held in high regard by the other X-Men, and Loki had enough trouble from Storm to not wish to make any more enemies among that group, so he tolerated it.

Piotr was only in town from Thursday through Sunday, and naturally wished to spend as much time with his fellow X-Men as possible before he had to return to his post. Piotr, Hank, Jean and Loki ended up in the teacher's canteen more often than not; Loki would have just as soon done without Piotr, as he was not enormously fond of the boy's somewhat brainless sentimentalism, but he found himself dragged along.

Given that there was a substantial (for mortals) age differentiation among them, the three current and former X-Men tended to fall back on tales of valorous battle - a familiar enough subject for Loki - and anecdotes about other mutants all three of them knew. More often than not this was Nightcrawler, aka Kurt Wagner, the dark blue-furred mutant that Loki had met so briefly and inauspiciously during his first week at the school.

Hearing them tell tales of Kurt's mischievous exploits stirred an interesting mix of emotions in Loki. He found some of the pranks amusing (and the teachers' exasperation over them even more so.) More than once, he surprised himself by wondering why such a joke had not occurred to him, himself. For some reason, ever since he had come to the school, he just had not had the energy - or the heart - to engage in any serious mischief. It wasn't that he feared approbation; it just didn't seem like as much fun as it used to.

Three days of Kurt stories was about all that Loki could stand. Everyone had one - even Hank, who had never had Kurt in his classes, knew a few good ones from his other students. Jean, of course, told them from the point of view of a teacher - and Piotr had several to relate as his shield-brother.

What annoyed Loki was not only the incessant way they could not stop talking about Kurt, or the abbreviated way they tried to avoid expressing regret for the fact that he was not here (as he continued to avoid Loki in all public spaces.) No, what nagged at his attention was that his own Kurt Experience - however brief - painted a very different picture than the happy-go-lucky, teasing trickster that the others described.

He had once been such a trickster himself, although his peers and tutors had never looked on his antics as fondly as Kurt's did. But if anyone knew how good a job the mischievous facade could do at keeping others from looking too closely, Loki did.

"I should like to get to know this Mr. Wagner better," Loki announced abruptly on Sunday night. Jean and Hank looked up at him with surprise, and Piotr beamed at him.

"That's very good news," Piotr exclaimed. "He is our friend, and you are also our friend, so we should all be friends together, yes?"

Loki ignored this commentary, especially how oddly it twinged inside his chest that Piotr - who'd only known him for few days, for the Norns' sake - should so easily call him a friend. "I must make amends for my former thoughtlessness," he said. "What is the appropriate social tradition for apologies?"

"I really don't think you have to do that, Loki," Jean said. "Kurt's not the type to hold grudges and besides, I don't think he's actually angry."

Loki shrugged. "Nevertheless," he said.

"You might consider bringing a gift," Hank suggested. "That's a pretty common tradition for both apologies _and_ just as a friendship overture, so it could work for both."

"An excellent suggestion." Loki considered it. "I shall acquire some alcohol for him, then. Alcohol is always a suitable gift, yes?"

Piotr nodded, but Hank and Jean were shaking their heads. "Normally it would be," Hank said, "but Kurt is underage."

Loki blinked. "I do not understand," he said. "Kurt is sixteen years of age, is he not? There are kingdoms in this realm where that is the legal age of adulthood, is it not? Xavier told me so."

"There are some, yes, but America isn't one of them," Jean said. "Here you can drive at sixteen, and vote at eighteen, but the legal age to drink is twenty-one."

"That is absurd," Loki scoffed. "A man who is sixteen in another country is sixteen here as well; you don't suddenly become younger simply because you cross a kingdom's border. How can you say that he is any less of an adult here than he is in his own country?"

Hank groaned and buried his head in his large, fuzzy hands. Jean gave a long-suffering sigh. "Loki, just humor us," she said. "Don't give any of our students alcohol. We're teachers; we're supposed to be role models, setting positive examples. Okay?"

"Ah," Loki said.

* * *

Two hours later Loki was knocking on Kurt Wagner's doorway, a pair of glass bottles clinking gently together in the bag in his hands. Kurt's rooms were set apart from the general boy's dormitory, among the apartments for senior students - or students whose mutation required them to have a room to themselves.

After a moment the door opened, revealing a curly-headed silhouette of deep blue darkness against the light behind. Only a puzzled-looking pair of bright yellow eyes shone in the light from the doorway. "Yes?" Kurt said, sounding surprised but polite. His eyes widened as he saw Loki there. "Herr Lehrer - Loki? Vhat are you doing here?"

Loki thrust the bag holding the wine ahead of him, forcing Kurt to stumble back slightly and allow the door to open wider. "I have come to repair my relations with you," he announced, and followed up on the foothold he'd gained by stepping forward into the doorway. "Do accept this token of my remorse and regards, in preparation for accepting my apologies for my earlier boorish behavior."

Kurt blinked. "Are you _asking_ me, or _telling_ me?" Kurt said, the thick accent evaporating out of his voice as he slipped into his native tongue. Loki handed over the package in a decisive gesture and Kurt automatically raised his hands to take it, arms dipping with the weight of glass and liquid. Loki took the opportunity to brush past him into the apartment.

"Er... do come in," Kurt mumbled, sounding somewhat confused and overwhelmed. He turned towards Loki, letting the door close behind him, and moved to set the bottles down on his kitchen table. As the paper packaging rustled and shifted, Kurt's eyes caught the labels on the bag and widened almost comically.

"What... this is _glühwein!"_ Kurt gasped, pulling out one of the long, ember-red glass bottles that Loki had brought with him. "And the little one, _mit shuss..._ Cherry wine with spices and cinnamon. And it is still warm?" he said with disbelief, laying his hand against the bottle.

"And will remain so until such time as you drink it," Loki said. "Really, it is not unlike the _gløgg_ they serve in Asgard. Considerably less potent, of course, but I thought the similarities fitting."

Kurt was still working through his evident astonishment at the gift. "But this is not to be found in America," he said. He raised his yellow eyes to Loki. "Where did you get it?"

Loki shrugged. "Where else? From a spirits shop in Germany, of course," he said. It had been nice to revisit the cold European country in a more peaceful spirit than the first time he'd been there - although he'd worn a glamor during his visit there, just in case.

"But Kitty had you in self-defense just yesterday. You went to Europe and came back in a single day?"

Loki smiled. "You are not the only one who can travel in the blink of an eye," he said.

"This is an incredible gift. I thank you," Kurt said solemnly. His expression fell. "But maybe you didn't know, it is against the rules for students to have alcohol in their dorm rooms."

"Is that so?" Loki raised his eyebrows, letting a faint mocking tone into his voice. "And since when have you been a great one for following petty rules?"

Kurt grinned at him shyly, and Loki matched the smile with one of his own. For a moment, camaraderie glowed between them, as sweet and warm as the mulled wine.

And then, because he was Loki and Loki destroyed everything he touched, he had to ruin it. "I wanted to speak with you about our... last meeting," he said.

Kurt's smile faded, although he didn't - quite - regain the closed wariness he'd had when he met Loki at the door. "There's no need, really," he said.

"But there is. I insulted you, and that was never my intention," Loki said. In hindsight, with the benefit of perspective, he could well understand (too well understand) why commenting on Kurt's monstrous appearance had hurt him so. "You must understand, in my culture, a warrior's strength is highly prized. Many go to rather extreme lengths to increase the ferociousness of their appearance. I thought merely to offer you a compliment. I... may have been exaggerating the effect of your appearance somewhat, in aim of that."

Kurt laughed. "So you are admitting that you were not entirely truthful?" he said.

"Well, I am not known for my excessive commitment to honesty," Loki said with a smile, drawing another laugh from Kurt. He quickly sobered, though. "I did not mean to hurt you."

"It's all right," the boy said quickly. "I forgive you."

Loki shook his head. "But I still need to know _why_. Lest I say something that hurts you again."

"It's okay, really," Kurt protested. "I'm fine. I'm more resilient than that!"

Loki raised his eyebrows. "Now it is you who are not being entirely truthful," he said.

Kurt moved about his home restlessly, picking up dishes and placing them down again. "I should not have troubled you, truly," he said at last. "It's just that, when I saw your markings... Well, they looked a little bit like scars. But too even, too smooth for battle scars. I thought that you... I thought that..."

"That I had laid these scars into my own skin?" Loki said. He shifted into his Jotun form easily, with barely a thought - both to illustrate his point, and also to try to make Kurt more comfortable in his presence.

"Yes." Kurt nodded.

"Like you have lain yours into your own."

Kurt was avoiding looking at Loki at all, now. "...Yes."

"Your markings are far too deliberate to be random, or accidental, any more than mine are," Loki said. "If not for battle, why then? If you were from Asgard, I would assume they had some magical purpose. If not magical, then perhaps sacred..." He caught the subtle flicker of Kurt's expression - gone in an instant, but not quick enough to hide it.

Kurt sighed. "It doesn't matter now," he said "I wanted, I just wanted to see if there was someone else like me, someone else who... did the same things as me, for the same reasons as me. Now I know that it's different for you, there's no need for you to worry yourself about it."

Loki could see the loneliness in his eyes, the longing for connection. _But I do worry,_ he thought.

He made his voice gentle, encouraging. "How can I know whether my reasons are the same as yours are not, or different, if I do not know what they are?"

"I am sure they are not the same," Kurt said firmly.

"Why are you sure?" Loki asked. _You can tell me, you can trust me, I will not betray you._

"Because..." Kurt hesitated for a long moment, then shook his head. "Because your people do not believe in God." His sharp yellow eyes rose to met Loki's, jolting them with their intensity.

"Not as yours do, no," Loki agreed.

For the common folk of Asgard - as it had been for the mortals, in centuries past - the matter was simple: Those who dwelt on the hill in the golden hall of Gladsheim were gods. End of story. It was they who were appealed to when feats beyond their normal lives were needed, and they who were paid tribute at the end of each season and on festal days.

But for the nobility of Asgard, who actually had to live in those golden halls, they knew it was _not_ so simple. They saw their 'gods' every day, after all, and knew their frailties and failings as well as their own. _Their_ concept of divinity was much more abstract and arcane.

For the Aesir, it was not simply the notion that higher powers than themselves existed in the universe. They knew that they did - the Fates, the Tree, the avatars of Life and Death and more that inhabited the world beyond their halls. But the fact that these beings existed did not make them gods, or requiring of worship. They simply _were_ , and belief made no difference to their lives - nor to the lives of men. They made poor targets for a religion.

Instead, the religion of Asgard centered around the notion of 'paths.' Every _as_ or _asynja_ , it was said, was dedicated at birth (by the fates, if not by their parents) to follow a path. Wisdom, Strength, Charity, Fertility, even Hospitality - there were as many different paths as there were leaves on the trees (although Strength was a popular one in Asgard, for obvious reasons.) At the end of the paths were the ultimate _forms_ , the pure concepts of pinnacle and perfection that could not for long exist in this imperfect world. Striving towards those pinnacles, even if they could never be achieved, was the religion of the individual Aesir.

Of course, a concept was a mindless and impersonal thing, passive and static. And an individual was flawed and weak, full of faults and imperfections. It was in the union of the two - the moment when the man _became_ the ideal - that godhood was achieved. So it was when King Bor entered the _berserkrgang_ , the battle-trance, and drove the Dark Elves from the face of the universe. So it was when King Odin immersed himself in the waters of Mimir's Well, linking his very life to the magical spirit-force of Yggdrasil. So it was when Thor summoned the storm and rode with it, commanding the lightning and the thunder. It did not matter that Bor was an indifferent bather and cheated constantly on his wife, Bestla; it did not matter that Odin snored (that Odin _lied_ ) and threw food scraps on the floor, or that Thor had a tendency to pick his nose and put his boots up on the furniture when he came in from the stables.

In those moments, the moment when force and form combined, they _became_ War, they _became_ Magic, they _became_ Storm. In those moments, they were gods.

Mortals, with their flyspeck lives, took comfort in the idea of a permanent and immortal God, ever changing and dependable throughout the ages. Immortals, who had an endless time of stagnant sameness to look forward to, rather found their divinity in flashes of ephemeral exaltation.

Loki, himself, had never found his moment of godhood. For much of his life this had been a source of private doubt and pain for him, never sure just what path he should be devoted to. In his childhood he had thought that he should devote himself to Magic, as Odin had, but he had never achieved that same state of divine ecstasy. For a time, after he had fallen from the Bifrost, he had believed it his destiny to be a God of Evil; but the vile acts he had committed in his time on Earth had brought him none of the fulfilment that the divine trance was supposed to bring, and he admitted to himself that he had not the stomach to try anything more extreme.

But this was all too much to try to explain to this young mortal, especially when he was clearly too troubled by his own thoughts already. "It's rather complicated."

"Complicated," Kurt echoed, then shook his head. "For us, it is different. God is not complicated at all. But like many other simple things, it is the hardest to explain." He raised his hands as though to make a shape with his fingers, then dropped them and huffed. "I am no missionary, nor a priest. They could say it better."

"I'm not interested in what they have to say," Loki pointed out. "I'm interested in what it means to you."

Kurt huffed a half-laugh, more a release of tension than true humor. "How can I say..." He ran his hand through his hair, then started again. "God is the Father, the Creator. He is the only one, the absolute, the everything. All-powerful, all-knowing. He is all things good, and he is perfection.

"Man, though... man is not perfect." Kurt ran one finger over the scars webbing his arm, his expression trouble. "We are all conceived in sin and born in sin, and however we may try, none of us can hope to live a sinless life. But because God is merciful, He is willing to forgive us for our sins.

"He gave us His son to suffer and die for us so that we might be redeemed, and He gave Saint Peter the Church so that we might be guided and cleansed. -The Church, they do much of God's work on Earth, but one of the things they do is to take confessions," he explained as an aside. "When you have sinned, you can go to a confessional and a priest will hear your sins, and tell you how you can be forgiven.

"When I was young and still living with my mother and brother and sister, we had the church in my home village. But after I..." He stopped, searching for words, old hurt written on his face. "...had to leave, it wasn't so easy. There are not many places I can go, looking as I do... I'm sure you can see why I would not be welcome into many churches." He gave a wry smile, gesturing at his darkened skin, his yellow eyes, his long and pointed tail.

"Even so I still feel..." He bit his lip. "They worry at me. My sins. I cannot go to be blessed but I am still human, I am still weak. With small things, bad thoughts, bad words, it is enough to think upon my sins and say my prayers, many times. The weight leaves me and I feel clean again. But with terrible sins, terrible things I have done... there is nowhere I can go to escape from them. There is no one who can lift them from me."

His expression was lost, desolate. Loki couldn't say that he understood, not really, but he could still feel a deep and almost painful empathy. He knew what it was to be heartsick, heartsore, cut off from everything and alone. If there had been some way for him to take a knife to his skin and cut off the Jotun blue, if by doing so there was some way he could have become one with his adopted people again, he could not say for sure that he would not have done it.

"These symbols..." Kurt ran his fingertips over one, outlining its shape on his upper arm. "They are the symbols of the angels, the language of God. I write them in my skin where God can see me, and hear me, and know my remorse. I write them on my skin and I remember how His son suffered for our sins... and in my suffering I feel a little bit closer to Him, and not so alone."

It seemed to Loki that if this God of men was really as all-knowing and omnipresent as Kurt believed, then he ought to be able to hear confessions wherever they were said, not just in a church - if he could see the scars, why not hear confessions? But the greater part of him understood that this was not about logic, not about reason. This was about heart, and about hurts that no amount of rationality could cure.

"But you are not alone, are you?" Loki said. "You have many friends, teachers, and teammates. They all care very much about you." He had to fight hard, not to let a bitter edge into his voice: he understood, rationally, that just because people liked Kurt didn't mean they liked _him,_ Loki, any less. But there were some hurts that no amounts of reason could cure.

"I... yes. The school is nice, the people here are very kind... I love my teammates, I am grateful for them. But it's not..." He trailed off, looking miserable. _It's not the same,_ hung unspoken in the air.

"It's not everything you need it to be." And that, Loki understands. The school was wonderful, welcoming; it offered sanctuary and camaraderie and acceptance. But it could never be _home,_ it could never be _mother, father, brother._ Those things are lost forever beyond repair.

"Some people have asked me why I still cling to my devotion to God, even after all that has happened," Kurt said. "I think, how could I not? He has been with me all my life; He saw me at my best and my worst. It is all I have that links me with my first family, my home. You see..." Kurt reached under his shirt and pulled out something that gleamed silver in the light. He held it out in one dark, three-fingered hand for Loki's inspection.

Obligingly, Loki bent close to look at the pendant: it was a symmetrical, oval shape, with the robed and hooded figure of a tall woman in bas-relief in the center. She was holding her hands out to each side, and her face was peaceful and serene. Straight, sharp-angled runes marched around the border of the pendant in a language Loki could not read. "It's a miraculous medal," Kurt told him, almost shyly. "Sacred to Mother Mary - born without sin, mother of Jesus, she intercedes for us. My mother gave it to me... it was the last thing she ever gave me. It's for protection, you see; she knew that I would need it, and that she wouldn't be around to give it to me any more."

Loki could tell at a glance that there was no true warding or spellwork upon the pendant; it was just a piece of jewelry, pretty perhaps, but nothing more. Yet there was something about the serene woman's face that tugged at his chest, and he deliberately broke off his gaze and leaned back to put space between them. "As a talisman of protection, it doesn't seem to have worked very well," he said.

Kurt looked surprised, then gave a little chuckle as he tucked the necklace away. "Well, maybe it has," he said. "Who can say? I'm still alive. It could always have been worse."

"I suppose so," Loki said. "I am... glad, that you have something that you can remember her by. Your mother." This time, perhaps, he was not quite so successful at keeping the bitterness out of his voice; it clogged his mouth like funeral ashes.

Kurt dropped his eyes. "I, too, am glad," he said softly. Then he blinked up at Loki and smiled, a real, heartfelt smile. "But that does not mean I am not glad to have friends, too," he said. "And ever glad to have one more. Come on, Herr Loki, will you share a drink with me? You should not leave without a chance to sample the gift you went to so much trouble to get!"

 

* * *

Loki walked back to his apartment slowly, still a little warmed by the wine and so deep in thought that any number of students could have hailed him without his notice. Lost in thoughts of how Kurt managed to cling to his faith despite years of loss and persecution, and somehow had not been degraded by it.

The image of a silver medallion, engraved with the image of that beautiful, serene face, refused to leave his mind's eye. Kurt truly was lucky, to have such a concrete keepsake of his mother's love; Loki couldn't help but envy him for it. 

But it need not be mere envy, did it? He found himself suddenly energized by the thought, excited by the possibility. Frigga had owned many things, many talismans and pieces of jewelry in Asgard. Perhaps he himself could acquire a keepsake of his mother, some token that could be used to remind himself of her...

that could be used to remind himself of her...

_No._

There was nothing on Midgard of hers, certainly. But he could return to Asgard, in secret, hidden from the eyes of the Gatekeeper and the Allfather...

_No._

Most of her greatest possessions would have been burned in her ship beside her, but she had been a queen and a mother for centuries; there would surely be some left, bundled and forgotten in corners here and there. He could still...

_No._

His own chamber had been emptied out, scrubbed to the bone and closed like a tomb; but perhaps Thor's...

_No._

He let himself into his apartment, silent and shrouded as a tomb; he let the door fall closed behind him, but did not move to ignite any of the lamps. The mild glow of the weak alcohol had worn off, leaving him cold and just the slightest bit dizzy. His mind churned restlessly within his skull, and he began to pace in the shadowed darkness, never content to be still.

Why did his thoughts shy away so hard from any thought of returning to Asgard? He could barely even think of the place without an intense swirl of compressed emotions; panic, fear, revulsion. Actually setting foot in the place was utterly unthinkable, even for the promise of some last token of Frigga's.

Why?

Was it denial? Did a part of him still cling childlike to the idea that as long as he didn't go to Asgard, he wouldn't have to face that Frigga was really dead? As though, if he could not see it, it would not be real? Certainly not. He was not that naive, not that self-deluded.

(Was he?)

It surely wasn't fear. Asgard had already done their worst by him and he had survived it; not only survived it, but proved himself well able to dodge and dazzle and deceive his way out of anything they could throw at him. Odin had already forsaken him; what more need he fear from his not-father? He certainly didn't need to fear Thor; his brother had wept for him, despite all that had passed between them. Thor, who had cared for him more when he lay dying than he ever had for him in life, would surely be overjoyed to discover that Loki was still among the living after all.

But no. No, that bridge was burned and gone behind him. In the eyes of Asgard, his home, his family - his allies, his enemies, everyone who ever mattered - he was dead. He was dead, and he was not ready to be not dead just yet.

Or ever?

 _But you're not dead, are you,_ the insidious little voice whispered in his ear. _Because the dead do not feel pain, and you do._

The realization hit him like a tidal wave, forcing him to his knees upon the thin carpeting. He was not dead. He was _not dead_ , and yet he had _wanted_ to be, had pantomimed his death for all the universe to see, had fled behind the finality and pallid stillness that death offered. He had never planned to falsify his death on Svartalfheim; he had thought instead to die in truth, and had been surprised (and disappointed?) to wake again alone on the howling plain afterwards. And afterwards, well, it was so much easier just to keep up appearances, to finalize his death in the eyes and minds of his home and loved ones. To be dead in the eyes of Asgard, as close as he could come to death in truth; he had _wanted_ to be dead, because...

_I remember how His son suffered for our sins... and in my suffering I feel a little bit closer to Him._

...because it was the only way left that he could be close to his mother.

He'd wanted to die in the same battle that claimed his mother's life so that his crest would hang beside hers in the halls of the honored dead, so that their names would be chanted together in songs of their courage and sacrifice. So that he and she would be remembered together. As though, if his death followed on hers closely enough, he could be reunited with her. As though that would let him see her again. But it wouldn't, not this farce of a half-life and not true death either; he knew, he knew he would never see her again.

She had taken a warrior's place in Valhalla, and he would never come before those golden doors, not if he died today nor a thousand years from now. He was trapped halfway - too useless to save her, too cowardly to follow her, and he would never, never see her again. Never, never again touch her, embrace her, smell her perfume; never tell her that he loved her, never hear her say the same, never apologize for all the wrong he had done to her, and never, ever hear her forgiveness.

Loki didn't realize he was weeping until he went to take a breath and found his throat closed and choking, his chest shuddering with the weight of his tears. He rocked back and forth mindlessly across the chilled floor, arms wrapped tight around his chest in a futile search for comfort. It was not only his apartment that was dim - the whole world seemed shadowed, the light failing and swallowed up behind the veil of grief.

He remembered a time, long ago... With a sudden burst of energy Loki managed to unwrap himself and scramble across the floor on his knees, wedging his back up against the overstuffed divan to support him. He crossed his legs before him and held his hands open above his lap, calling flickers of light to his fingertips.

When he was very young, he had cried often. He could no longer remember why - everything had seemed bigger in those days, overwhelming, and himself small and powerless against it (and had that ever really changed?) On those occasions Frigga would take him upon her skirts, hold him in her lap and call effervescent blue light to her hands, creating figments and chimera into the air to entertain him. It did not take much to distract his child-self from whatever had prompted the stormy tears, and soon he would watch with open-mouthed wonder while she made the apparitions dance and flutter. One fateful day he had raised his hand to join hers, and wan flickers of green light had appeared in his own chubby fingers, his own magic called in response to hers - and that had been the beginning of the end.

He had his magic still, the magic that Frigga had taught him. Even if he never set foot in Asgard again, even without any scrap or token of her possessions to remember her by, he would always have this. No one could take it away from him - no one could poison his memories of her except for himself, with all the cold and curdling uses that he had put her gift to in the past few years.

Loki could sit here all day and all night, calling illusory butterflies to dance in his palms, but no matter how hard he tried, the color of the magic always retained that stubborn taint of green. The pale blue luminescence of Frigga's magic was gone, to be seen in these realms nevermore.

He wished he could have attended her funeral.

He wished he could have seen her again, before she died.

He wished he could have told her that he was not a traitor, that all he had done was with the best interests of Asgard and the Nine Realms in mind.

He wished she had not died believing her younger son a monster.

He wished he did not believe it himself.

Above all, he wished he could have had a chance to say good-bye.

* * *

~tbc...


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki makes a true friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More of the sort-of not-really spoilers for Thor 2. The timeline was different in this 'verse, so certain events played out differently than in the movie, but I did attempt to arrange things so that the emotional impact on Loki would be about the same.

Somehow -

(unfairly,)

\- the world did not end.

The sun continued in its orbit, the lonely single moon did not crash into the benighted sea of this planet, and time continued in its relentless march. The weekend passed on by, and come Monday the life of the school returned to its usual pace.

Loki did not.

He barely roused himself to the extent of sending messages to the front office that his classes - all of them - were cancelled for the week. He offered no explanations as to why, but the young lady squiring for Xavier offered to record it as 'sick leave,' so perhaps this was a common hazard of frail mortal existence.

He sent word to Xavier himself that he would not be coming to any sessions this week, and received back a note in reply saying that Xavier would respect his choices, but looked forward to seeing him again. He also avoided his by-now routine meeting with Hank and the other teachers. The only duty he could not bear to neglect was Illyana's magic lessons; she needed him far more than he needed to be alone, and he could not bear to abandon her when her control over her magic was still so fragile. Could not bear the thought of failing her, too.

So he continued to meet with her, sessions in the evening that felt like nerve-grinding agony that sapped his strength every moment he was out of his rooms. Still, if no progress was made, at least Illyana did not backslide; and she was young enough, and preoccupied enough with her own problems, that she took no notice of her instructor's strange demeanor.

Except for those hour-long meetings, Loki did not leave his apartment for any reason. The shadowed rooms began to bear down on him, stifling like a prison - yet to step outside of them was more stifling yet. At least in his rooms he could lay on his bed fully clothed and pretend to the normalcy of sleeping.

In his more lucid moments, Loki disgusted himself with his pathetic show of listlessness; lying about like a broken thing, fit for no more than turning food into waste. If Thor were here, no doubt he would castigate Loki for 'sulking' and stand his bed on its end to dump him and his blankets on the floor. But Thor wasn't here.

He should get up, get himself together, and _go -_ this he knew, yet he could not bring himself to do such a thing. To do anything. For all his wild thoughts raced, they only wore deeper ruts in his mind, like rats trapped in a bare kennel, finding no new outlets.

He could see no way forward from here. Asgard was closed to him forever - not because he feigned at being dead, nor because he feared Odin's censure or the outrage of his once-people - but because Frigga was gone and ever would be until Ragnarok, and he knew he could not bear the pain of that golden realm without her.

Yet he knew not where else to go. Jotunheim would remember his treachery, barring the world to him even if he had any desire to go there (which he didn't.) Svartalfheim was no more, and the rest of the realms too tightly held under Asgard's hegemony. Going to any of those would be as much as serving himself on a platter for Odin and Heimdall.

That left Midgard, yet he knew that his past actions would make him a pariah here, any place in the world save this one sanctuary. Nowhere else was he welcome, nowhere else was he safe - yet he could not prey on Xavier's misguided hospitality forever. And so his circling thoughts returned once more to the grey world around him, to the reality of a life with all the golden light gone out of it.

The week dragged to an end, and another one began; still Loki stayed in his rooms. The food in his apartment was starting to go stale, although only the slightly crunchy texture alerted him to this fact; either way, it tasted like ashes.

He suspected if he cancelled his classes another week, it would most likely elicit some kind of inquiries; so he avoided the problem a little longer by sending copies of himself to teach his classes for him. They were not terribly clever simulacra, but they could stand at the front of the room and deliver a pre-recorded lecture well enough, and Loki had enough memories of his own school days to know that a stuffed dummy could often fill the role of teacher just as well.

On Tuesday... or perhaps Wednesday, the days were beginning to all blur together... there came a knock on his door.

For long moments Loki just stared at the ceiling, debating the merits of closing his eyes and ignoring it. But the knock came again a few minutes later, louder and more insistent, and Loki knew all too well that if he let this go to its natural conclusion it would just result in a _scene._

With a sigh Loki pushed himself to a sitting position, then to his feet, and looked around the empty apartment and then down at himself with a grimace. Neither it nor he was in any state to receive visitors, but he had neither the time nor the energy to make himself presentable in the space of time before his visitors grew too impatient. Glamour it would be, then. He covered the space behind him with a bland, spartan illusion of neatness and himself with clean pressed clothes, healthily washed skin and neatly combed hair, and opened the door.

A trio of visitors decorated his front step; Hank, Jean, and Cecilia. Of course it would be Jean; she knew where his apartment was, having been the one to show him to it on the first day. No doubt Hank had badgered her for the information, and dragooned Cecilia along too. "Yes?" he said, his voice cool and uninviting.

They stared at him, taken aback, although he wasn't sure by what - surely he wasn't so unpracticed at illusions as to have let something slip through. Hank was the first one to break out of the momentary stupor, shuffling forward on his stoop. "Loki..." Hank said hesitantly. "Is everything, er, quite all right?"

"Certainly. Why wouldn't it be?" Loki lied smoothly.

Hank looked uncertainly past him. "I couldn't help but wonder why all the lights are off."

Blast. Loki had been leaving the lights off in the apartment for so long that he'd stopped noticing it. He glanced briefly behind him before facing forward with a calculated trace of irritation. "Yes, I was just on my way out."

"Out?" Jean's eyebrows rose. "Really?" Her voice was heavy with skepticism.

"Yes, why is that so hard to believe?" Loki snapped.

"Loki, you haven't been out of your apartment in a week! You stopped coming to the canteen," Hank protested.

He sounded like that fact was a genuine loss to him, and Loki pushed aside an unexpected pang of remorse. "I wasn't aware that my attendance was a requirement," he said dryly, with a pleasant and false smile plastered on his face.

"You stopped attending your own classes, too," Cecilia spoke up. She exchanged a look with Jean, who nodded firmly. "For your _own_ classes, attendance kinda _is_ a requirement."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Loki lied. "Why, I gave a lesson on Svartalfar bio-technology just this morning."

"No, you didn't - and you weren't at yesterday's lecture either," Jean said. "Artie was the first one to notice it, and he asked me to confirm it. Whatever's giving lectures in the great hall _looks_ like you, but there's no psychic presence at all. It's just an empty shell."

 _How appropriate,_ Loki thought. Simulacrum or not, that came uncomfortably close to the truth.

"Loki, what is going on?" Jean asked sternly.

Loki felt his smile twist unpleasantly on his face. "Perhaps I'm taking up my evil ways and plotting to overthrow the world," he spat. "Is that why you're here? To check to make sure I'm not doing something terribly unheroic?"

"What? Of course not!" Jean said, and the edge of offense to her surprise felt real. "We just wanted - "

"Well, I _wanted_ to be left alone," Loki said grumpily. "Is that so much to ask?

"Left alone? You've become a recluse!" Cecilia said incredulously. "It's not healthy! You need to get out, get some fresh air and some UV radiation before you waste away in there."

Loki eyed the three of them suspiciously. So, rumors had already spread throughout campus of his degeneration, it seemed. And the three of them just _happened_ to come looking for him out of the goodness of their hearts... unlikely. "Did Xavier send you?" Loki demanded. "More of his orders to be _nice_ to the poor little refugee, is that what this is?"

Hank sighed in worried exasperation. "Loki, we're here because we _care_ about you!" he said, enunciating each word with precision. "We're your friends, and when something is wrong we worry."

Loki blinked, momentarily left at a loss. _You care...?_ he thought.

"Of course we care," Jean said firmly.

He felt his brittle fury ebbing away, but the empty space it left behind was almost worse. Thick longing rose in his throat, weighted his tongue. He could not meet any of their eyes - his _friends'_ eyes. How could they call themselves his friends, so easily?

"I..." he said. It was hard to force the words out, but he knew he would not get away until he said something. "I just... need some privacy for a time. Some quiet. It is no reflection on any of you, or of anyone at this school, I can promise you that."

Hank and Jean exchanged a look. "So this isn't about anything that Kurt said?" Jean asked.

Loki blinked. "No, of course not. Why would it be?"

"Apparently he was the last one to talk to you before you suddenly went underground," Hank said. "He was convinced that he had said something wrong, something that hurt you. Quite distraught about it, really. He begged us to bring his apologies to you, ask if there was anything he could do to make up for it."

"Ah." That made Loki squirm, caught between pleasure that someone thought of him even in his absence - that he was real enough to exist in their minds even when he was gone - and shame for adding to the boy's already heavy burdens. "No, it wasn't his fault, not at all. I am sorry if I made him feel otherwise."

"Well, I can tell him, but I don't know if he'll take my word for it," Jean said. "It would really be best if you told him so yourself."

Loki sighed and reached up to rub his eyes. Was the outside world always so blasted bright? "I just... I need some more time," he said. "I am sorry for neglecting you all, or the students. I needed..." he trailed off, paralyzed by the thought of trying to put all that crushing weight of grief and loss and hopelessness into words.

"I understand," Jean said quietly, and something in her eyes - the dark flash that Loki had caught one or two times before - said she really did.

"But, Loki, you still can't stay in here forever," Cecilia picked up the refrain now. "Maybe not now, but - perhaps later? There's a field trip we normally take at the end of January - a bunch of the kids and a few teachers go to a ski lodge in the Adirondack Mountains -"

An _adventure._ Loki pushed down a twinge of nausea, allowing no hint of it to show on his face as the doctor continued, "The whole place is closed down except for us, so we're guaranteed privacy. Kurt will be there, as well as Piotr and Kitty and Bobby and most of your defense class. We thought maybe you would like to come along?"

"Perhaps," Loki said. It's a very convenient _perhaps,_ a _perhaps_ that meant _no_ but without allowing for persuasion of appeal. He could keep on saying _perhaps_ right up until the others left on whatever quest this was, and be left in peace.

And _perhaps_ was useful in other ways, too; now that they had some feeling of having made progress, the others were at last willing to decamp from his doorstep and leave him _alone._

He took a deep breath once they were gone, feeling at once relieved and strangely hurt, a pang of loneliness in his chest that made no sense. He didn't want them here, he didn't want to socialize and be nice and pretend everything was all right, and yet... he didn't want to be alone, either.

Loki rubbed a hand over his face. _We're your friends,_ they had said. How could they say that so easily? They barely knew him, and what they did know of him was mostly ugly, full of violence and hate. They knew the _truth_ about him, and yet they called him friend. How?

He knew, in an intellectual way, that Midgardians did not bear any particular fear or hatred towards the Frost Giants, not as the other realms did. Yet it was hard to truly come to terms with that knowledge, to pull the biting cold over his skin and look at them with ruby eyes and not see fear and disgust looking back. Did the mortals not realize that Frost Giants were a threat to all civilized beings, that they had once crawled out of their caves and menaced this very realm, coming to conquer the realm for their own -

He laughed aloud, hollow and bitter in the silence of his rooms. Earth had a much more _recent_ memory of an evil Frost Giant who had invaded their realm, coming to conquer to destroy. It had not yet been even a year here on Midgard since that happened; the grass would not yet have had time to grow over the scars. And his identity was no secret; they all _knew_ who he was, _what_ he was, what he had done.

And yet still, they called him friend.

He didn't understand.

He couldn't understand.

Loki had never had friends before, not really. His age-companions at Asgard had always been Thor's friends first and foremost, Loki's only secondarily if at all. _Friend_ meant someone you did battle with, someone you trusted to guard your back and whose company you sought out for adventures. Loki had been in no great battles with the X-Men here, had done nothing to prove his valor and worth to them - and yet still they sought him out for their own adventures, sought out his company when he hid himself away.

_Why?_

What did they see in him that made them think that he was trustworthy? What did they see that Asgard never had?

His head throbbed, the thoughts that swirling round and round his brain without release. Loki pressed his temples hard for a moment, dark fireworks blooming behind his eyes, before he released with a sigh. Mortals were strange, inexplicable beings, he thought, and mutants no less than their human cousins. Perhaps he did not need to understand their ways to accept them.

It was getting late, and he hadn't yet eaten anything today. Loki turned back to his kitchen, intending to search out anything that hadn't yet gone spoiled.

 

* * *

 

The knock on his door came the next day, well into morning - late enough that any but the true layabouts would be awake, but not yet time for the noon luncheon. Loki started towards the door with a frown, casting his magic outside to see who had come to his door. If it was Hank and the others again, come to pester him more about this winter adventure of theirs, Loki was simply going to glamour an empty apartment.

But instead, it was Kurt.

"Ah, Herr Loki, you are awake," Kurt said cheerfully. He hefted "Good morning to you! Am I allowed to come inside?"

"No," Loki said flatly, blocking the width of the door with his body. He had not even invited Hank inside his apartment, his personal sanctuary. He certainly was not going to allow a student, let alone a _known troublemaker_ , into his personal space. "You are not."

"Okay," Kurt said amiably. Loki was somewhat surprised by the lack of resistance, and was off-balance for just long enough for Kurt to disappear from in front of him with a soft _bamf_ and reappear behind him inside the apartment.

"Have you had breakfast yet today?" Kurt called from Loki's dining room as the god whirled around, staring in disbelief. "No, I see you are not. Oh my God. Is this food? Bagels are not supposed to be green, you know."

"I said you were _not_ allowed inside, you impudent child!" Loki snarled, and Kurt gave him one of those startlingly white grins.

"Yes, but I have a reputation for doing things I am not allowed to," Kurt said blithely. "They are usually the most fun. I have brought food. Shall I put it away, or do you want to eat some of it now?"

"Don't... I don't want to..." Loki trailed off, letting the door fall closed behind him as Kurt bounced around his kitchen, leaping up to hang from the ceiling and investigate the cupboards. He sighed in irritation, running a hand through his hair. He had not wanted Kurt to come inside, but now that he _was_ inside, he was a guest and must be treated with courtesy. His mother had not beaten good host-manners into him in vain all these years, after all. And Kurt had brought food, as a proper guest ought. Did Midgard have some knowledge of civilized customs after all? "I was not expecting guests. I have not prepared."

"Indeed. The others say you have not left your house in over a week! They worry that you have fallen sick." He held up a brightly colored package from his bundle. "Not to worry, I have brought chicken soup. I am told this is a traditional American remedy for illness. Normally I would recommend a hot beer, but unfortunately the beer in America is all so terrible it must be served cold, so that is out."

Loki watched incredulously as Kurt continued to unload food into his kitchen. "What is a _chicken?"_ he asked.

Kurt paused and sent a wide-eyed look over his shoulder, as if unsure whether Loki were playing a joke on him or not. "Err... small flightless bird... raised for meat and eggs... _buckaw, buckaw?"_ he flapped his elbows in a comical manner, but Loki only stared at him. Kurt shook his curly head in disbelief. "Now I know you really _are_ from another planet."

Loki stiffened. "Yes, well, how lucky I have you to remind me," he said coolly.

"I have offended you," Kurt observed sadly. He put down the last packages of food and turned from the counter to face Loki. "That was not what I came for. It was my intention to apologize for... the other day. For whatever I may have said which inspired such melancholy, I am sorry -"

Loki made a sharp chopping gesture with his hand, cutting off the boy's maudlin sentimentality. "I told Jean Grey, there's no need," he said with some asperity. "You had nothing to do with it. You couldn't know. It wasn't your fault."

"And yet you did not mean to harm me either, and yet you came to apologize," Kurt said earnestly. " _Sorry_ does not mean only that I think it was my fault. I am sorry that you are grieved, whether it has anything to do with me or not. I can at least offer an ear, if you wish to share your sorrows."

"Don't be absurd," Loki snorted. "I don't need to 'share my sorrows.' Words can do nothing to change deeds past; poring over my mistakes will do nothing to alter them."

"No? But that can be the most valuable gift of all," Kurt said, a wry twist in his lip and a wistful note creeping into his voice. "Just being able to confess to someone, whether they can * _do_ * anything about it or not - just knowing they will listen and will not judge."

A certain unconscious emphasis on the word _confess_ reminded Loki that this was a sore point indeed for Kurt, who longed to be able to attend confession and yet could not. Knowing that, Loki could not find it in himself to refuse the offer outright, even though part of his mind screamed what a bad idea it was to open up to anyone. How unwise it was to let himself be vulnerable - to anyone, even a mortal child.

Kurt surveyed his furniture for a moment, then reached out and pulled one of the dining room chairs away from the table to sit astride it backwards. His tail waved lazily in the free air beside him, and he rested his chin on the high back of the chair and looked at Loki solemnly.

"There is a deep sorrow on you," Kurt observed softly. "Tell me, what has happened that makes you sad? Who have you lost that you miss so much?"

A searing pang of grief spiked in Loki's throat; he closed his eyes and swallowed against it. For all his sneering assurance earlier that words would change nothing, he felt like they would poison him if they went too much longer unsaid. Without looking he reached out to take another of the dining room chairs, leaning heavily on it as he pulled it around and eased himself slowly down.

"My mother," he admitted quietly. "My mother is dead."

Kurt made a tiny noise, like a swallowed gasp, although nothing about his expression and posture spoke of surprise. "When did it happen?" he asked softly, sympathetically.

"A season ago. A week ago. Does it matter?" He rubbed his hand over his eyes. "Some months ago - before I came to this school - I had reason to return to my, my home. Asgard." He hadn't meant to call it that - _home -_ but the word snuck up his throat and out his mouth before he tripped on it.

Kurt nodded. "Yes. You returned because there had been an attack, is that correct?"

Loki gave him an incredulous look. "How could you know that?" he demanded.

Kurt looked shamefaced - his skin actually flushed a darker blue - and he squirmed a bit. "I... eavesdrop sometimes," he confessed. "It is a good way to know things I would not otherwise be allowed to know. In this case, I listened in on a phone conversation between Professor X and Director Fury of SHIELD. They were discussing your departure and how likely you were to return."

Ah. Loki supposed that made sense. He sighed. "Well, what you heard was correct," he said. "At the time I departed Earth, I knew no more than that - that some enemy had assaulted Asgard, that the situation was dire and my help was needed." He fell silent for a moment, remembering. "Although I had no idea, then, just how dire it truly was.

"From the time Thor left Earth for Asgard till the time I left to follow him - it was only three days of Asgard time. But... those three days were more than enough. By the time I returned to Asgard, my mother was already dead."

"What happened?" Kurt asked softly.

"Malekith the Accursed," Loki said, his voice thickening with rage and loathing, "waged war. He had not the strength to take Asgard in a frontal assault, so he snuck a group of his agents into the cells below Valaskjálf ahead of time. They broke out of the prisons, slaughtered their way to the shield generator and tore it down... allowing Malekith and his army to attack from the front.

"My mother - Frigga - had been a shield-maiden in her youth, and her sorcery had only grown more magnificent with age. All the Realms feared the power of Odin's wrath, but her power was just as great - greater, when called in defense of hearth and home, as it was then."

He took a deep, steadying breath, and felt a warm rush of wonder and near-awed respect as he continued the tale. "The All-Mother took back the shield room with only a handful of guards and handmaidens, and then she brought the shield back up... alone." His voice shook, just thinking of the tremendous feat, wishing he could convey just how great a feat this was to a naive Midgardian. "You must understand, that shield would have taken a coven of _seidkonur_ a year to construct. In Asgard's greatest need, she brought it back in an hour. The effort was a tremendous strain on her life-force; it nearly killed her. But...

"But?"

"But then Kursed did." His voice descended to a hard snarl, as memories of the monstrous berserker filled his mind. Even now, a realm away and months later, his fingers curled into claws as though he could tear through that burning armor with his bear hands, rip out the poisonous heart. "He struck her down but _moments_ before Thor arrived. The one moment it mattered most, and he was too _slow,_ late as always, tardy and useless, and I was -"

He cut himself and forced another deep breath, tamping the useless, bitter rage back into its bed. "Kursed and Malekith escaped the palace, then withdrew to the rest of their stinking army to siege - a standoff that still held when I arrived," he said in a more normal tone. "The attack took place on the first day of Thor's arrival, and the funeral took place the next day - the day before I arrived. Apparently, no one thought that I should be invited to attend."

"Oh," Kurt said in a very small voice. For once he had no comforting words to offer, no naive platitudes about the good intentions of people he had never met.

"I suppose," Loki said, forcing the words out of his throat with great effort, "they felt so oppressed by the besieging army camped outside their door, that they feared they would never have a chance to honor the sacrifice of Asgard's queen unless they did it _right then._ Still, you would think it would at least occur to... someone, to contact me on Midgard during all this and at least provide a notification."

A memory bubbled up, vile and scalding, of Thor's face when Loki had thrown these accusations at him - couched in much less diplomatic terms, of course. _I am sorry, Loki,_ was all Thor could think to say in his defense. _So much was happening all at once - the attack, Mother's death, Father falling into the Odinsleep, the loss of Mjolnir, rallying the warriors, fortifying the defenses - it all fell on my shoulders. In the chaos, it simply_ slipped my mind.

 _Slipped his mind._ It was a wonder he managed to remember which end of the hammer was the handle, most days. Let anything vanish from immediate sight and it might as well cease to exist, like a child in his first days of learning to walk. Loki supposed they were all fortunate Thor even remembered the dark elf army still existed, the moment they withdrew beyond the walls - lucky he even remembered Loki's name, let alone his promise to return after three days -

"She sounds like a valiant lady - your mother," Kurt said tentatively, breaking into his increasingly heated and hurting spiral of resentment. "To save the whole kingdom as she did. Her death was a noble sacrifice..."

"It was pointless! Wasteful!" Loki snapped. "And utterly unneeded. If Odin or Thor had given two seconds' thought to what would be involved in defending Fensalir - if either of _them_ had cared enough to aid her - she need not have died! But no, they were all of them too intent on offense to consider defense - too busy smashing in dark elf heads on the front lines to give a thought to the rest of the palace. And I... I wasn't there."

His vitriol ran down, the hot flame of anger guttering low. "I was rotting away in a cell on Midgard, held at the petty whim of Director Fury while _my mother_ was murdered. I could have _saved her..._ "

He remembered his return, a facade of brittle arrogance wrapped around him like a cloak, prepared to barter with the knowledge that _they needed his help,_ that they had come on bended knee to beg his assistance. Remembered walking into a room with the Warriors Three all battered and bloody from their futile, misdirected defense of Asgard against the dark elves' attack. The first exchange of insults and heated barbs, the gradual piecing together of news: Kursed's attack, Malekith's siege... Asgard's casualties.

In his shock he had let his tongue run away with him, hurled blistering accusations as to their incompetence and disloyalty in their faces until they very nearly started another battle right there in the drawing-room. Sif had been particularly enraged, nearly strangling him with her bare hands as she screamed, _What use were you? What use were you on Midgard, what use were you in your cell?_

Still coated with a layer of grime and splashes of blood, streaked with tears. As though she had any right to berate him - as though her grief for Frigga was any greater than his. As though Frigga had been any more Sif's mother, mentor and sponsor and friend to the half-wild shieldmaiden for hundreds of years, than she had been his own.

"I'm so sorry," Kurt said.

"The last time..." Loki trailed off, stopped, started again. The tale of Frigga's death was over, but Loki found that his words were not yet spent. " ...The last time I saw her was when Thor turned on me - made me out to be a traitor to Asgard." Of course that hadn't been how it had happened, at least not in her eyes.

"And then that mess in New York -" and the less said about that, the better - "She must have known of it, if Thor knew to come. She must have thought me truly lost in madness, given over to evil. I was _not..._ But I never had time to explain to her, never had time to... ask for forgiveness. Her last thought of me was as a criminal and traitor." _And a monster._

"I am sure that's not true," Kurt said with quiet certainty. "Above all, you were her son. She would have loved her child till her last breath. They say that the love of a mother is an endless well, at the bottom of which you will always find forgiveness."

Loki sneered. "A pretty fantasy of motherhood, but I'm afraid one not always reflected in reality," he spat.

"But she wasn't just any mother, was she?" Kurt countered. "She was the _All-Mother_ , a queen among mothers. She was willing to give her _life_ to protect her people - a heart so great as that could never fully harden against her own child."

"But." Loki looked away, biting down on his lip to try to keep the words inside. They crawled up out of his throat anyway, like poisonous bile. "...but I'm... not."

"Not her child?" Kurt demanded, and for the first time there was a lash of real anger in his voice. "Just because you were _adopted?_ Listen, I knew all my life that I'm not my mother's biological son, but that didn't change a thing about my love for her - or hers for me!"

"She knew what I was from the moment she first found me - this skin, these hands, these eyes." He gestured towards himself with harsh, forceful movements, yellow eyes glowing eerily in his fury. "She knew everything and _she still chose me._ And _your_ mother chose _you_. Do you think your bond is less because you aren't related by blood? It is all the _greater_ for it."

Loki felt something in him splinter and break at those words. To his horror, he found that he was crying again, insistent pressure building up behind his eyes and demanding to be released. He could no more stop it than he could the tide, and for a moment he seriously considered teleporting somewhere else, or teleporting Kurt somewhere else, or maybe just cutting to the chase and killing one of them so they wouldn't have to endure the embarrassment of this moment.

But Kurt seemed to understand the weight of his feelings, because after a moment he got up from the chair and began moving around the kitchen again, putting packages away and moving dishes into the sink; anything to turn his back and give Loki some illusion of privacy. Loki let the tears flow, and unlike the burning pain of his earlier grief, these tears were ones of relief.

He had been poisoning himself, mixing his grief for his mother's loss with his own guilt - and the paralyzing fear that Frigga had died hating him, and that nothing he would ever do would change that. of course Kurt hadn't known Frigga, didn't know, couldn't know... but his words rang true for once, they had the weight of worlds behind them, of forces that not even death could stop. It still hurt, but it was more of a cleansing, healing hurt; like peeling away a bandage to purge an infected wound, or setting a broken bone. At least now, it would be able to heal straight and clean.

After a time the storm calmed, and Loki sat still and quiet at the kitchen table, tears drying in cool tracks along his face. Kurt came back from wherever he had disappeared to, and wordlessly offered Loki a handkerchief.

"Let's get out of here for a while," Kurt said. "This apartment is too gloomy, it smells of close air. Come with me - I have something I want to show you."

Loki felt worn out, as though he'd been fighting or spellcasting for days straight - but also lighter, cleaner. Kurt was not wrong about the apartment; it stank of moldy food and of tears. "All right."

It was 10 AM, and the campus was surprisingly quiet. Few people were abroad; it was too late for the breakfast rush and too early for the lunch crowd. Those who had morning classes were in them, and those who did not - like students everywhere - were likely still abed.

Despite still being deep in the grip of winter, the sun was smiling today; the sky was bright blue and the air was dry and crisp. And cold, yet despite how much he now hated the reason behind it, the cold had never bothered Loki. Kurt seemed unbothered by it either, making no concessions to the low temperature beside a fluffy scarf. Loki followed him across the campus, between grand buildings and walkways lined with leafless trees.

Much to Loki's surprise and intrigue, Kurt suddenly took a sharp turn to the left, away from the well-trodden walkways and through a gap between two bushes. They slogged through a small, leaf-littered yard, then turned to squeeze between the back ends of two buildings. Their grand facades facing elsewhere, from this vantage all you could see was overhanging ventilation shafts, small frosted windows covered over with frost-touched ivy.

Then Kurt turned a corner of the building and vanished, the hushed * _bamf_ * and accompanying acrid smell of his teleportation hanging in the air. Loki paused, suddenly wary of an ambush - but then Kurt's voice called out to him, slightly muffled "Herr Loki, over here!"

The voice seemed to be coming from inside the building. Loki walked towards it, then paused in front of the seemingly blank wall; there were no doors or windows on this stretch of the building. "In here," Kurt's voice came again; "It's sealed off from the rest of the building; you have to teleport to get inside."

Well. That explained where Kurt had gone, but Loki was not in a hurry to follow in the same manner - if one tried to teleport into an unknown location, one was likely to end up spliced into a solid wall. Instead he took a leaf from Kitty Pryde's book; he reached out with his magic to touch the brick-and-plaster of the nearest wall, momentarily phasing it out from the rest of the universe, then walked through it.

He found himself in a strange, oddly-shaped room. It formed an irregular crescent, with two corners leading away into nowhere and the inverted shape of a staircase forming the ceiling above. Kurt was waiting inside, eyes shining in the gloom, beckoning him towards a narrow crack in the outer wall where bright sunlight spilled through and made motes of dust dance.

"This is one of my secret places," Kurt explained, as Loki looked about the small, strange room with great interest. "No one knows it is here - it was sealed off after construction was finished, and there are no entrances and exists. You can only get in and out by teleporting... or by magic, I suppose," he grinned.

"Are there many places like this around the campus?" Loki asked, his curiosity alight.

"Yes, quite a few," Kurt said. "I have found many that no one else knows. I have some special advantages when it comes to exploring - and so, I suspect, do you." He gave Loki a sly wink.

 _Oh, yes._ Loki had always been fond of places like this - secret, unremarked spaces that made up the edges and borders of things. They were excellent locations to conduct secret experiments, or to hide from unwanted retribution - or just to be alone.

He knew of a hundred such spots in Asgard, but had never yet found any equivalents at Xavier's school. It was a great honor, Loki realized, for Kurt to share his secrets this way. Places like this, which offered uninterrupted privacy, were a treasure more precious than gold.

"Come, come here and look," Kurt said. His voice was lowered furtively, and Loki found his curiosity burning higher as he went over towards the crack of light. Kurt stood aside to make room for him, and as Loki stooped and peered through the crack he got an excellent view outside: there were a few trees and another wall that formed a little power, a pretty place that gave the illusion of privacy. Except, of course, from a unique vantage point like theirs.

"This is a very popular make-out spot for some of the older students," Kurt whispered in Loki's ear. "In this way, you can keep track of who is making time with who in any given week - who's fighting, who broke up, who made up - who started dating someone else without telling them that they made up."

Loki gave a startled laugh, although he smothered it abruptly at the sound of footsteps on the pavement outside. Two young voices - one male, one female - drew nearer, deep in conversation. Judging by the sappy, maudlin tones, they were whispering sweet nothings and confessions meant only for each other.

"No, we can't, there isn't time," a female voice whined. "I have to go to class soon - you know I can't be late to physics again or the professor will fail me."

"We still have a little longer, Allison," the male voice said wheedlingly. "I've hardly seen you at all this week, and I miss you so much..."

Both Kurt and Loki raised their eyes to glance at the other in the same moment, one silent eyebrow raised in inquiry. Decent people, Loki knew, would decamp at this point; it was shockingly immoral to eavesdrop on a couple's most private moments, and no one but a scoundrel would continue it knowingly.

As one, both dark heads bent back towards the crack.

 

* * *

 

It was late in the evening of the same day; once the sun had gone down and taken its slight warmth with it, the dropping temperatures had driven most of the warm-blooded students and teachers indoors. Kurt had gone back to his own dormitory, after earnestly promising that he would show Loki more secrets of the school some other day.

It had been... fun, spending the day with an unexpectedly kindred soul. As friendly and kindhearted as he was, Kurt had a very refreshing lack of interest in obeying arbitrary rules or social mores; he did what he wanted, when he wanted, and his only concern was that others would not actually be hurt in the process. Flustered perhaps, momentarily inconvenienced or embarrassed perhaps, but never truly hurt.

Kurt's cheerful demeanor covered a deep and old hurt, but there was nothing false or forced about it; he truly lived for the present, unclouded or poisoned by the pain in his past. It was a skill Loki wished he could learn to emulate. But then again, there was a great deal that Kurt could learn from him as well, especially in the realms of acting and dissimulation, plus bonus lock-picking. (Kurt had tried to argue that he had no need to learn to pick a lock when he could teleport. Loki had countered with the same logic he'd used on Kitty: what if his powers were taken away? It seemed the possibility had never occurred to the young mutant before.)

Now that he was alone, the feelings of happiness and exhilaration he'd gained from their evening of hide-and-seek had begun to fade, he felt again the strange calmness of emotion that he'd felt after his outburst of grief that morning. It was relieving and restful, a moment of... emptiness, almost numbness, after the black storm of depression that had clogged his mind and weighed his body for over a week. Or perhaps longer. Much, much longer. Loki was not even entirely sure when was the last time he had not felt it, lingering at the edges of his consciousness.

It truly did feel like the calm after the rain had passed; cold but also clean, all of the dust and debris in his mind settled. He felt lighter, as though a great weight had been shed - as though he could do anything. He was not sure how long the sensation would remain with him, but he intended to make the most of it while it lasted.

And so he found himself walking the familiar steps towards Charles' office; there was a trace of guilt for remaining away for so long, but it was mild. Throughout all the months they had known each other Charles had always been true with him, always been faithful, and so Loki believed the man when he said that he was not angry that Loki had stayed away. That these meetings were for Loki's peace of mind and not his own, and were not meant to be payment or obligation.

Even though it had been nearly two weeks since their last meeting, stepping into Charles' office felt as familiar as ever. Charles was waiting for him, his other work closed and filed away, hands folded over each other as he greeted Loki calmly. "Hello, Loki. It's good to see you again. I gather you are feeling better?"

"Yes, I am," Loki said, even though it hadn't really been a question; the answer still surprised himself, really. Charles cocked an eyebrow and tilted his head subtly in Loki's direction. Loki inhaled and braced himself as Charles' power swept over him; he held onto the lingering feeling of peace and lightness as Charles searched through his mind to see why he had come.

He had not ever discussed Frigga with Charles; he had not been able to bear it before, and still did not want to. The thought made him uncomfortable for reasons he could not name, but trusted Charles to respect; still, there was something else on his mind that he _did_ want to talk to Charles about, something he thought that his mortal friend would be able to help him understand that no one else would.

The tingling feeling faded as Charles finished his sweep, and nodded as though Loki had answered another question entirely. "So," he said. "Are you ready to talk about your suicidal ideation now, Loki?"

Loki stood still, turning over Charles' words in his mind. _Suicidal ideation._ What a strange, clinical, even cold way to describe it: this feyness, this furious self-destruction, this wish-for-death that had lurked at the bottom of his soul for so long. "I think so," he said.

Loki crossed over to the old armchair and sat down slowly, turning over Charles' words in his mind. He didn't sound at all surprised, even though Loki had never spoken of it before - had not even thought of it before, not consciously at least. "Did you know that this was within me?" he asked.

"I suspected it," Charles said calmly. "But you were very good at hiding it, even for yourself."

Loki let out a small, strained chuckled. "I suppose I am," he said. He took a deep breath and sat back in the chair, thinking back, searching for a place to begin.

"I should explain first," he said at last. "In Asgard, such things are not done... are not even talked about. A good death is one in the service of one's life: a warrior's death in battle, a woman's death in childbirth. Those are the ones that after their deaths go on to Valhalla, Folksvangr or Helgafjell. To take one's own life... there is no honor in it. Such an unlucky soul would be doomed to Nastrond, the shores of the dead. It would never be thought of for a son of Odin to go there."

"But you did think of it," Charles observed.

Loki shrugged. "Sometimes," he said. "When I was younger. Usually I thought of my death in some great battle, someday, defeating some terrible foe. I thought of how grand my funeral would be, how brightly my ship would burn. I thought of all my family crying for me, and how sorry all my friends would be that they'd been mean to me." _I thought that it would be the only way I could ever really beat Thor - the only way that no one would ever be able to say that I hadn't done enough, hadn't tried hard enough._

"Such things are not uncommon fantasies in children," Charles said. "The fantasy of the funeral, getting to be there and see other people mourning for you."

"I suppose," Loki said. "But the daydreams stopped eventually, when I realized that nobody would."

Charles looked sad, and Loki could see a disagreement hovering on his lips. His shoulders hunched somewhat; he didn't want to hear it. After a moment, Charles sighed and chose another topic. "When was the first time you acted on these impulses, instead of merely thinking about them?"

Loki remembered a shattered bridge, a jagged rain of falling crystal, an endless fall - of Odin's face looming above him, blocking out the sky, and two simple words that cut out his heart. _No..._ "That wasn't the first time," he said aloud, the realization coming to him suddenly. "It was before that. The day after Thor's banishment, after his trip to Jotunheim.

"A Frost Giant had grabbed me, here," he touched his arm, "and my skin changed to be like theirs. I couldn't stop thinking, wondering... There was only one way to be sure. I went to the weapons vault where the Casket of Ancient Winters was stored. I thought, people might lie to me, but magic never would."

"So you thought that touching the Casket might harm you?" Charles asked. "Did you hope that it would?"

"No... well... not exactly." Loki frowned, floundering over the words. He thought of the Destroyer, its imposing bulk looming behind the enchanted cage, its unchanging visage glaring out over the Casket. Its duty was to guard against Frost Giants and it performed that duty with mindless brutality. Loki had known, even as he approached the plinth, that if he was right in his guess... if he really was a Frost Giant... well, he'd seen the evidence of it in the charred and smoking corpses of the invaders, less than a day ago.

"Either I was a true son of Odin, and the Casket would reject me," Loki said quietly, "or else I was not, and the Destroyer would kill me. I would have preferred it - I would rather have been dead than Jotun. Either way, I would win."

"Dying isn't winning," Charles reminded him.

"Perhaps," Loki said with a small shrug. "But at least you're not around to feel the shame of defeat."

There was a short silence after that, and Loki could almost feel disapproval radiating off his mentor; but Charles' voice was quiet and uninflected when he asked, "And after that?"

"After my fall..." Loki licked his lips, thinking about it. Without that feeling of calm serenity, he could never have looked back so easily at the ugly, painful, measureless time he'd spent, in the captivity of Thanos the Mad or upon Earth. Even now, it was hard.

"I never tried to kill myself, not in so many words," he said slowly, thoughtfully. "I think... my pride still wouldn't let me stoop to that level. I merely... _arranged_ things such that there was a chance that they would end in my death. And if that chance never took, well then - I would arrange something else. And something else, and something else." He laughed bitterly. "But I suppose I am as much of a failure in this as anything else - even when I set all the heroes of Midgard and Asgard against me, I still didn't manage to die."

"Death by hero is not a very reliable strategy; they generally prefer to avoid killing their enemies, when they can," Charles observed.

"So I learned," Loki said acidly. "But the same was not true for the dark elves; there is nothing they like better than killing their enemies." Brief, nightmare visions of the Dark Elves' assault on Asgard flashed through his mind; watching his countrymen die in agony, listening to their screams and the crushing of armor on bone and flesh as they were swallowed by the infernal gravity grenades. It had given Loki great, vicious satisfaction to turn their own weapons on them, to watch Kursed be swallowed by that inexorable, agonizing death.

Of course, he would have found much more pleasure in it if he hadn't been bleeding out through the chest at the time. _That_ had been unpleasant.

"So it was not your intention to fake your death?" Charles broke into his memories." You actually believed that Kursed would kill you?"

"It was always a possibility," Loki shrugged. "I was... a little disappointed, when even that failed." In some respects it was a perfect death; he was unlikely to find a better one.

"I am not," Charles said in a voice of steel.

Loki closed his eyes, feeling the burn of shame mixed with gratitude at that thought, that _sentiment._  It warmed him to know that someone cared for him so much, even if there was still a stubborn part of him that insisted he was not _worthy._ Charles continued; "Listen, Loki, you are not alone in this. Other people have had the same thoughts, the same feelings of you, and survived them. Many times people feel like their death would be a favor to the world, that everyone would be happier if they were gone. But it's not true. It's _never_ true. There was never anyone who took their own life whose loved ones would be happier for it."

"Mine might," Loki said with an effort, through a mouth that felt dry as dust. He managed a careless shrug. "I'm a bit of a special case."

"They all think they're a special case."

Loki's eyes snapped up to meet Charles', burning with anger and something more. "I'm a monster -" he started.

"Loki," Charles interrupted him. Unspoken in the air hung the promise he had extracted from Loki; _you said you would not use that word for yourself again._

"Fine," Loki said with a roll of his eyes. "I'm a criminal, _that_ much you can't deny. I'm the supervillain who destroyed New York. After all of that, who in this world would possibly miss me?"

"I would," his mentor said quietly. "Your students would. Your fellow teachers would. And Thor -" - oh, that was a low blow, dragging that oaf into this - "You told me that he cried for you, when he thought you were dying. You know that he would. You are loved and valued, Loki. Remember that, and don't be in a rush to throw all you have away." He waited for a moment, watching Loki carefully. "All right?"

Slowly, Loki nodded. "...All right," he said. He felt suddenly tired, worn down by the prospect of so much expectation; the cool clarity he'd felt when he came in was scattered. Charles made it sound so simple, but it _wasn't_ , no matter what he said. Even if there were some people who would truly miss him, they didn't _need_ him; they'd get over it. And there were still far more that he had wronged, that would celebrate to see him dead.

Still - he would try. He had to try, he'd promised he would. And he knew, even if Charles was careful not to say it, that it was what Frigga would have wanted of him. Not to rush to his death to join her in Valhalla, but to live on.

"All right," he repeated, a little stronger this time, and Charles smiled at him.

* * *

 

~tbc

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, whew! I promised things would get better for Loki -- and they should continue to get better. The last two chapters were so painful that I decided to schedule the next one to be pretty much pure fluff to make up for it. Hence, the sudden introduction of the yearly skiing vacation. 
> 
> We'll also see more of Kurt and Loki bonding, now that they've gotten past their inauspicious first meeting and traded sad stories together. The other teachers are going to regret having encouraged them to make friends, pretty soon. Actually, I would be happy to hear reader suggestions for shenanigans that Kurt and Loki would get up together -- I'm not really much of a practical jokester myself!


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki and the mutant students take a road trip, and much snow and hijinks ensue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As promised, here is a chapter of nearly-pure fluff to make up for the last few. I'd say it's about 88% fluff (and 12% Sad Loki In Snow, but still pretty fluffy.) 
> 
> Also, while I picked the blue and gold teams fairly at random, I found out afterwards that apparently the X-Men divided into two teams at one point, with Scott leading the gold and Storm leading the blue! So, I guess they're just practicing.

The day dawned bright and fair, if cold, near the end of January. Although it was Friday, the campus was clear of students trekking to and fro: classes had been cancelled for the day, as it was the first day of the winter training trip. Not all of the students were going, of course, but it would have seemed an injustice to force the ones who stayed behind to attend classes with half their peers missing, and so an unofficial holiday had been declared.

The teachers' quarters were not completely without activity, however. Loki listened in, fascinated, as a small party of teachers and retired X-Men approached his apartment door; they were apparently unaware of his superior hearing as they whispered to one another in what they no doubt thought was a secretively furtive volume.

"All right, when he opens the door, Bobby and I will keep him talking," Hank's gruff voice gave orders. "The important thing is not to let him get a word in edgewise, so he can't outright say no. Rogue, you slip by into his apartment while he's distracted and pack a quick bag for him; and Piotr, once we're ready to go, you can keep him moving until we're on the bus."

Loki nearly laughed aloud as they rounded the corner; even without such sharp hearing as he possessed, the entire party of them - from the dark blue fur to the bright silver metal skin - could hardly be considered unobtrusive. He watched with amusement as two of them approached the door while two others stayed out of sight - or would have been, had the young woman Hank addressed as Rogue not carelessly positioned herself before a window.

After they had rung the doorbell twice without response, the would-be raiding party began to grow restless. "Is he even home?" Piotr asked in a loud whisper.

Hank scoffed slightly. "He's not left his apartment in two weeks, where would he go now?" he asked.

"But if he's not even answering his door..." Rogue peered nervously through the window. "Should we do something? I mean, is he even okay?"

The display of concern - unnecessary as it was - left Loki feeling warm in the chest and throat as though he had just taken a swig of glogg, and he decided that he'd waited long enough. Uncrossing his arms and pushing away from the tree against which he'd been leaning, Loki dropped the glamor which had cloaked him (though not entirely vanished him) from the naked eye. "Looking for something?" he asked mildly, and took a small malicious pleasure at how wide their eyes became when they whirled around.

"You're - Loki!" Rogue blurted out, then clapped her hand over her mouth.

"Last time I checked, yes," Loki agreed amiably. "Now, why are you lot skulking about? Aren't you supposed to be preparing for your journey?"

"Yes, well," Hank said with a hint of a stammer, righting the glasses that had been knocked askew in his startlement, "We, er, thought we'd drop by and..."

"It is a kidnapping!" Piotr chirped brightly from behind Hank's shoulder; the older mutant shoved his glasses back on his face and gave him a dark glare.

"You weren't supposed to _say_ that," Rogue hissed.

"Is that so?" Loki said, amused by the idea that these mortals could presume to take him by surprise, or hope to force him anywhere against this will. Well, in all fairness, they probably couldn't have even if Kurt Wagner _hadn't_ teleported on by earlier, giving him an early warning of his teammates' nefarious plans.

He reached down and picked up a canvas duffel bag that lain unobtrusively by his feet. It contained sturdy clothes for camping, as well as any other activities they might get up to, and a number of other miscellaneous supplies. Years of adventuring with his brother had taught him how to pack necessary and pack light. "Well, let us not dawdle, then," he said. "We certainly don't want to make everyone late simply because you got sidetracked. Coming?"

They gawped at him, and Loki grinned to himself at the expression on their faces as he turned down the path.

 _"Someone's_ in a good mood today," he heard Bobby mutter behind him, most likely to Hank, if the hum of agreement was any indication. It was true. He _was_ in a good mood - inexplicably content, almost cheerful. There was an almost giddy feeling in his head, an expansive lightness in his chest, as though he had been underwater for months and could finally _breathe._

It had not been only Kurt's visit that had convinced Loki to change his mind about this whole adventure, nor was it merely that he had grown thoroughly sick of the same four dull walls around him. (He had grown sick of _that_ quite some time ago.) But the thought of fresh vistas was appealing now in a way it had not been for months - years, perhaps? A journey, even one to the rustic backwater countryside of Midgard, was an excellent idea.

Several large, bulky vehicles were already gathered along the wide avenue, with a wide disarray of students and teachers and their various luggage being maneuvered aboard. Loki recognized many of them from his classes - Kitty, Illyana, Allison, Doug, Tenko, Artie, and many more - and it seemed that just as many of them recognized him. Not only recognized him but, if the turning heads and dawning grins were any indication, were _pleased_ to see him with a traveling bag over his shoulder. Kurt was grinning madly, his teeth a white sliver of mischief in his dark face, and Kitty was blushing in his general direction - small change there.

"Professor Loki!" Tenko called out, hurrying over to his side. " _You're_ coming on this stupid trip, _too?"_

Loki raised an eyebrow at her. "Yes, I am."

A wide grin split her face. "Cool!" she exclaimed.

She really seemed to mean it. A look around the assembled beaming faces seemed to indicate that she was not the only one. Loki felt something in his chest crack, although there was no pain, as he might have expected. They _all_ wanted him to come along. They _wanted him_ to come along.

He took a deep breath - it helped steady him, a bit, so that his voice came out smooth and practiced and not wobbling or breaking. "Well then," he said. "Let's get going, shall we?"

* * *

Years of traveling between realms - even planets - had given Loki a somewhat disproportionate sense of distance, and the time needed to cross it. As it turned out, their destination was not at all far away, barely two hundred miles by the way the humans counted distance. Left to himself, he could have crossed that distance in an hour, even without use of the Bifrost to make the distance instantaneous.

It quickly became apparent that the challenge inherent in this journey was not in the sheer distance to be crossed, but in the management of the children under their care. The trundling caravans they loaded aboard were comfortable enough at the outset - for a short period of time, while standing still - but another animal entirely when in motion. The chaos generated by a busful of energetic, raucous, and variously powered mutant children could not be underestimated, nor could the overpowering smell of fumes from the primitive fossil fuels that drove it. Loki quickly took to riding on top of the bus rather than inside it, despite the protests of the other teachers that he was setting a poor example (again.)

Loki was accustomed to traveling alone, or with Thor and his friends - and however boisterous and irresponsible they could be at times, when invigorated by strong drink or the lust of battle, at least they were all grown men (and one woman) who could mostly govern and care for themselves. The same was not true for these students. They were forced to stop periodically for refueling, food, and bathroom breaks, or simply to allow the children to run around and expend some of their wild energy.

This was also the first time Loki learned first-hand that some mortals were so frail of constitution that even motion itself could sicken them. The disorder was rare, the teachers claimed - at least until one entire bus came down with it simultaneously. An emergency stop had to be made before all their efforts to keep the children fed over the course of the day could be violently undone, and yet the same strange malady started up again as soon as they began moving. Not only the children but even the teachers soon found themselves nauseated, despite their protests that such things _never_ happened to them.

It was Loki who finally managed to narrow down the cause of it: this was the bus that had Artie, the green-tongued mutant child, aboard. It was Artie alone among the busful that was actually sick, but unconsciously managing to spread his misery to others. Loki had noticed earlier that while not as powerful as Jean Gray or Charles Xavier, Artie had a certain capacity for telepathic projection. And while the other humans on the bus were not sensitive enough to pick up on his thoughts or words, they picked up on his virulent seasickness quite readily.

Fortunately Loki had some of his medical supplies packed away in his duffle bag, and a quick teleport-assisted trip around local inns and way-stores provided some missing ingredients. He was soon able to whip up a potion of cloves, ginger, and athal spirits (he longed for Icelandic moss, but none was to be found in this area of the world) to ease the child's stomach, and they were able to resume their journey with no more messy interruptions.

Loki returned to his place at the top of the caravan; he enjoyed the fresh air and the unrestricted view, and the speed and motion were not enough to put him in any danger of falling off. Nor did the keen air bother him - and for the first time since he had discovered the truth of his heritage, it did not bother him that the cold did not bother him. It was merely convenient.

After an hour or so had passed, one of the older students - the one called Bobby, who had accompanied Hank to 'kidnap' him from his apartment - climbed up on top of the caravan with him. Somewhat surprised, Loki made room for him on the flat apex of the vehicle, and the boy flashed him a grateful grin as he settled down, apparently no more bothered by the cold than Loki himself. Thankfully, the roar of their passage precluded any attempts at small talk, but it was nice to have some company nonetheless.

The scenery unrolled around them as the caravan rattled on. Gradually the broad, winter-barren farmlands gave way to rolling hills covered with leafless trees, then to taller slopes turned a misty blue with evergreen foliage. In the distance, the stone ridges rose higher yet, capped with broken sheets of bright ice and snow. The highways became smaller, the small villages they passed along the way sparser, as the settled land gave way to hushed parkland. It was not true wilderness - nothing in this part of the country seemed to have escaped the taming hand of mankind - but still an enclave of the natural world, dreaming its timeless dreams.

The mountains had not the grandeur of Vanaheim; the forested slopes had not the fey beauty of the deep woods of Alfheim. But they were beautiful all the same; and beauty, however humble, was not to be scorned.

* * *

As the overloaded buses wheezed their way around the final hairpin turn and their destination was suddenly revealed before them, a cheer rose up from the passengers. Part of it was no doubt joy to be at their journey's end, so that the true adventure could begin, but most of it was probably just to be _anywhere._

Although as 'anywheres' went, Loki thought, this one was not bad. They were turning into a broad valley nestled between high ridges of stone, frosted with thick sheets of white. The hills they had scaled were not anything like what Loki would call _real_ mountains, not by the standards of Asgard, but they were high enough (and the season early enough) to still have a generous serving of snow softening their flanks. Dark evergreens dotted the slopes here and there, more as a framework to the broad blank canvases than a centerpiece; there was also a steady regular pattern of tall iron poles linked with cables that Loki could not quite fathom the purpose of, marching up the hillsides.

Down at the bottom of the valley, sheltered comfortably by rolling slopes and protective walls of rock from any potential avalanches, perched a large hall of dark wood. It was three stories high, with a sharply angled roof to shed snow giving it an illusion of greater height than it really had. The dark-stained wood was a sharp contrast to the bright snow around it, but a profusion of windows dotted the long sides of the building and cheerful smoke rose in a steady stream from its chimneys. It looked quite warm and inviting, a welcoming rest after a long cold journey.

A few other, smaller outbuildings surrounded the main block, and there was a broad flat asphalt courtyard between them. The buses pulled up in the courtyard and began disgorging children and teachers; most of them headed for the hall, although a few others made beelines for the outbuildings. They carried duffle bags and long canvas-wrapped skis and frighteningly intent expressions.

"That's the lodge," Hank indicated helpfully when Loki hesitated between one building and the next. "We'll be eating and sleeping there - might want to drop off your kit before anything else, and stake out a room if you want one of your own. There's no other guests here but us, but there's still never enough rooms to go around."

Loki nodded, hefting his own bag and following Hank into the lodge. It opened into a long, high-roofed hall that still managed to feel cozy due to the unfinished beams holding up the ceiling and the fires that crackled in grates at either end. Beyond the grand hall were smaller corridors lined by rooms, each of which looked out onto the slopes beyond, a magnificent view framed by heavy dark curtains sufficient to block out the blinding reflected light of the snow. Some were large enough to contain four beds, others only two; Loki occupied a small room down by the end of the stairwell, and his demeanor dared any other teacher or student to challenge him for sole occupancy of the room. No one did. Loki did like his friends and students, but he also greatly liked his privacy.

Coming back the other way he crossed paths with a mortal carrying stacks of towels; his frown sharpened upon her as he realized that she held no trace of mutant power. When he caught up with Hank in the main hall, he asked in an undertone, "Were you aware that the staff is only human?"

Hank nodded, looking unperturbed. "Of course," he said. "We have an arrangement with them; they're all quite friendly to mutants, or at least discreet enough to keep their feelings to themselves. We come out here every winter, as well as various other trips throughout the year. Professor X arranges for it - he wants the students to stay in contact with the outside world, and that includes interacting with non-mutants from time to time."

"Wouldn't it be more prudent to limit interaction with humans whenever possible?" Loki said. "If you don't venture out casually, no one can betray you."

Hank sighed. "That may be, but Professor X doesn't want us to isolate ourselves." His voice dropped in volume as he continued. "He believes it's important not to shut ourselves away, to only interact with humans during conflicts or emergencies; that the humans need to see us just being ordinary folks... and that the students need to have memories of humans that aren't all bad."

"Ah," Loki said. That was definitely Xavier all over. He wasn't sure he completely agreed with the sentiment - it seemed to him that the tangible risk outweighed the rather abstract reward - but he could understand the reasoning.

He was distracted from his contemplation of this by a sudden outburst of noise and scuffling from the other end of the hall. Two young female voices, apparently drawn into a squabble over a mislain piece of luggage. "Excuse me," Hank said, and hastened away to mediate.

* * *

It was not that Loki didn't know what skiing was - or even that he didn't know how to ski, himself. It was a well-known art on Asgard (there was even a god, or rather a goddess, devoted to it - Loki had met her a few times) and Loki had used it on many an occasion when his adventures with Thor took him to snowier climates than ever-warm Asgard. But it was an uncomfortable, tiring way to travel, and Loki really had been at a loss to explain why they had traveled all this way to engage in it. The moreso because there didn't seem to be anywhere in particular that they planned to go, and were not equipped for long hikes or camping in sub-freezing weather.

When he went outside the lodge, to be greeted by the ecstatic shrieks of children whizzing down the steep, snow-covered slopes on their skis, it finally made sense. So did the strange arrangement of poles and cables tracking up to the top of the ridges. At first he had taken them for something like dwarven minecars; but as he saw pairs of skis go gliding through the air high over the heads of the skiers below, he understood. This peculiar arrangement allowed the children all the fun of zooming down the hills at high speeds, without having to endure the tiring slog up again. It was a remarkably lazy arrangement, but then Loki, who had occasionally been known to teleport from the dining room to his bedchambers and back again just to save himself the walk, was hardly in a position to throw stones.

It was all very fun and exciting. And as much as Loki would have liked to hate the icy-cold environment for its winter chill, the sun-touched slopes were too bright and shining under the blue winter sky, the silhouette of the mountains and trees too lovely for him to think of dark and jagged Jotunheim. Perhaps this 'adventure' was not going to be as tiresome as he feared, after all.

A skier shot by him, flailing and whooping, and Loki's head turned to follow as the figure launched into the air and did a somersault. It was Bobby, and the sun glittered off crystalline skin as whorls and bridges of ice followed in his wake. He did not limit himself to the dips and rises of even the advanced ski slopes, instead using his icy powers to create ramps and tracks for himself that allowed him to leap and cartwheel through the air.

A collection of students had gathered by the foot of the slopes to watch him in action, including Rogue, her hands to her mouth (and, Loki suspected, her heart in her eyes.) Bobby noticed her watching, and his antics grew even more elaborate in response. As he coasted down the slope, knees bent, he held his arms out in front of him, palms down. Frost poured from his fingertips even as he quickly gained momentum, and he tucked his body in and flew into the air off the sudden ramp of ice he had created, backflipping into a loop-the-loop that carried him neatly back to his starting position. The sun caught on the glittering shards of ice he'd summoned mid-leap: they snowed demurely down in formation in the exact center of his loop, forming a crystalline heart in midair. The students applauded. Somewhat shyly, Rogue held her hands in front of her torso, facing him, with the fingers clasped and thumbs angled to form a heart right back at him.

Loki had to admit, it was an impressive display of ice-crafting. He knew of course that the frost giants of Jotunheim had a similar command of their own element, but he had always regarded their bulky and jagged ice-weapons as crude and ungainly. It had never really occurred to him that icework could also be beautiful.

Thoughtfully, he wandered away from the crowd of skiers and ski-watchers and found himself a little private spot, a copse among the trees. Although the ground of the clearing was blanketed in fresh snow, the closeness of the trunks meant that no other skiers were likely to venture here. With a bit of privacy assured, Loki shifted to his Jotun skin and made a few attempts at calling ice to his hand.

It was not as easy as he had assumed. The ice did not respond to his thoughts as magic did; he could not merely will or mentally order ice to appear. It was more like flexing a muscle in his arm, except that he did not know which muscle he needed or how to trigger it. It was very frustrating. Finally, after many failed and increasingly agitated attempts, he managed to get a sort of rind of ice to form on his skin. But rather than forming into an edge or a point, as he had seen the other frost giants do, it merely thickened in a shell around his hand, crystallizing outwards with no shape to it.

Abandoning for the moment his attempt to make a Jotun-style weapon, he tried instead to copy the technique he had just seen of pouring frost from his fingertips. This he could not do at all. The most he could manage, after several attempts, was a sort of blast of cold air outwards from his hand. Which, aside from re-icing a beverage that had been allowed to warm to room temperature, Loki could not see any practical application for at all.

By the time a disgruntled Loki abandoned his practice and his little copse to rejoin the others, they were gearing up for what appeared to be a snow battle. He was immediately pounced upon by representatives of both sides.

"Loki, you will be on our team, yes?" Kurt asked him, making what could only be described as puppy-dog eyes.

"Hey, no fair!" Bobby objected, from his side of the long line drawn in the snow. "If you and Professor Loki are on the same team, that'll be way too imbalanced. No adult X-Men on either team, that was the terms!"

"But Herr Loki is not an X-Men," Kurt argued triumphantly. It seemed that he and Bobby were team captains, each on opposite sides. "Therefore, he does not count!"

"I don't suppose either of you considered that I may not be _interested_ in attending your pitiful mockery of a skirmish?" Loki said dryly.

"Er... no," Kurt admitted.

"Sorry, Professor," Bobby mumbled.

"I shall supervise," Loki announced grandly, and wandered over to the sidelines to observe, and also try to figure out what on Midgard the rules were supposed to be.

The students were to be divided into fairly matched teams (negotiation of what powers constituted 'fairly matched' to other powers was getting quite heated.) The team headed by Bobby was wearing blue jerseys, the team headed by Kurt wearing gold. The teams would have thirty minutes to build snow forts and stockpile ammunition, then the battle would begin. Powers could be used to paralyze, blind, or confuse enemy team members, as well as to manipulate the terrain, but the only allowable strikes were of snowballs (which had to be below an agreed-upon size.) Players were considered 'dead' after three strikes to the head, chest, or spine area, or else many more strikes to incidental areas such as the limbs or hands.

Simple enough rules, but allowing for a great variety of strategems. Although Loki was accustomed to a much more hard-edged (literally; Asgardian weapon practice did not traditionally make use of blunted weapons) style of training, he could see how this could hone their reflexes and grasp of tactics. While involving a great deal more fun and a great deal less blood than other forms of war games.

It seemed like in such a battlefield, the mutant known as 'Iceman' would be at an overpowering advantage - and indeed, his team managed to construct a much grander ice palace while the enemy team was still laboring to build basic walls and roll snowballs for ammunition. However, once the whistle blew and the battle began in earnest, Bobby quickly found himself the center of a very determined, multi-pronged assault by the other team, who were clearly bent on eliminating him from the game as soon as possible.

Loki left the snow battle raging like a hurricane about Bobby Drake, and wandered vaguely around the edges of the skirmish. Over by the trees lining the field, his eye caught on a familiar figure lingering about the edges of the battlefield, and he headed purposefully in that direction.

It was Kitty, and just like that first day in the defense classes, she was hovering about the edges of the skirmish watching the others with cautious eyes. She was not all there to his senses, indicating she had phased. Loki fetched up beside her and adopted a casual posture, crossing his arms and leaning against a tree. He cleared his throat, catching her attention, and she whirled around.

"Aren't you playing?" Loki asked, nodding towards the wintery mayhem taking place out on the field.

"Oh, yes, I am," Kitty said. The blue jersey that hung loosely on her skinny frame proclaimed her team's allegiance.

"You don't seem to be doing very much," Loki observed.

She shrugged, looking discouraged. "Well, I can't really do much in a fight like this, can I?" she asked. "So I figure I'll just wait for the strong ones to knock each other out, then join in when it's just the weaklings like me left."

Loki considered this. "And what if they knock out all the weaklings first, and then you have the strongest of the survivors hunting you down?" he asked. "It's much wiser to support your team while it is still strong, than to find yourself alone and without aid later." Ironic words, he knew, coming from him; but just because he had always gone his own way in battle and in life didn't mean he couldn't recognize the value of working as a team. It's just that such value was for others, not for him.

Kitty's shoulders slumped. "That's true... but what can I do? I mean, my powers are all purely defensive." She waved a hand through a snow-laden branch in illustration, her fingers passing right through. "If I'm phased I can't hold a snowball, and if I'm not phased, they'll nail me in a second!"

"You could serve as a decoy," Loki suggested pragmatically. He often used his own insubstantial clones to such effect. "Draw the enemy's fire, while remaining phased so that none of their missiles land a mark."

"...I guess I could," Kitty muttered. She did not sound very enthusiastic about the idea.

Loki supposed he did not really wish to encourage Kitty to develop tactics of that sort; deliberately drawing fire from enemies was harmless enough in a practice bout like this, but in a real battle there was no way of knowing what kinds of fire she would see from enemies. A sudden image of Baldur flashed through his mind, and the gruesome end that he had come to at the hands of his own friends. No, better not to teach bad habits.

"Well, then, why don't you keep most of you phased, but then unphase just the hand that holds and fires missiles?" he suggested instead.

Kitty blinked. "Um... I can't do that," she denied, then paused. "Um, can I do that?"

Loki raised an eyebrow. How could she know so little of her own self, her own body, to ask him that question? "Have you ever tried?" he asked.

"No... I..." She chewed her lip. "Won't my hand, like, fall off my body?" she said nervously.

"I don't see why it would." Loki made a negligent gesture. "If you are able to move any of your body at all when phased, then clearly there is more joining your will to your flesh than mere tendon and bone."

Kitty worried over this idea, hovering in indecision. "Try it," Loki prompted her. "And see."

For some time after that Kitty hung around the edges of the copse, her presence fading in and out of Loki's senses as she struggled to fine-tune her powers. Loki quickly grew bored, and considered going off to find some other task to occupy him, but she seemed to draw encouragement from his presence, so he stayed.

"Oh!" Kitty exclaimed, as her hand suddenly caught at a handful of snow, dragging finger-marks through the white slate for some time. She still seemed insubstantial to Loki, all except for the hand which held the snow, fizzing with presence. "Oh my god! I did it!"

"Well, are you just going to stand here?" Loki demanded of her. "Or are you going to go out there and teach all those overgrown louts to fear your presence?"

She grinned at him, then dashed off, holding a snowball in one hand while her legs and torso passed smokelike through obstacles in her path. Loki heard a shriek of joy as she joined the fray, and it left him still smiling as he teleported to a higher vantage point to watch the carnage.

At first, the battle seemed to be going to Bobby's team. However, a coordinated assault by Kurt's team combined to knock him out: Piotr shattered Bobby's icy barriers with a mighty crash while Kurt teleported in behind him to assault him with snowballs from behind. Reluctantly, but with good grace, the so-called Iceman dragged himself off the sidelines to watch.

Once their team captain had been removed from the fray, the rest of Bobby's team began quickly collapsing. Kurt especially was an absolute terror in battle - even mock battle; he was able to rapidly teleport from one spot to another, appearing behind his opponents to nail them with snowballs at point-blank range, and then be gone before any retaliation could reach him. Loki was somewhat disappointed to see Kitty be tagged out; she had un-phased in order to try to carry more ammunition, and taken a succession of snowballs to the chest. Still, while the girl seemed disappointed to have lost, at least she had overcome her initial wary fearfulness of the melee.

Rogue was tagged out. Piotr was tagged out, despite his loudly complaining that he was in his metal skin and hits shouldn't count. Allison was tagged out. Bobby's team was dwindling rapidly without him, driven back to hide in the remains of his ice fort as they were surrounded. The blue team was down to a paltry two players, with six remaining under Kurt's command.

Loki found himself growing increasingly restless. There was no fun to be had in watching such a one-sided battle, he told himself. Before he could fully think through what he was doing he was on his feet and striding towards the snow fight, casting a quick glamor of a blue vest over his clothes. "Pardon me," he said, tapping a startled Rogue on the shoulder, and then brushed past her to step onto the snowfield. "Tagging in here, if you don't mind."

Kurt spotted him and grinned, hoisting a snowball high. "I knew you couldn't resist, Herr Lehrer!" he called across the meadow. "Too bad, what a shame, you picked the losing team!"

"We'll see if they'll stay losing for long," Loki called back.

"You are outnumbered!"

"Oh, are we really?" Loki grinned, then spread his hands and split into half a dozen of his clones. And the battle was on.

The next thirty minutes were a hectic, scrambling battle across the snowfield, snowballs and splinters of ice winging every which way through the air. The gold team struck out at blue-jerseyed opponents only to see their missiles fly through thin air as the illusions flickered out, leaving them confused and pulled out of formation. One member of Kurt's team saw a perfect shot at one of the blue-jersey'd opponents and threw a snowball fast and true, only to have the illusion fall away and reveal one of his own teammates spluttering snow. As the unlucky snowball thrower tried to apologize, his former teammate walked up, picked up a handful of snow and shoved it down his jacket; as the two of them fell to rolling about in a snowdrift, the referees called them both out.

Gradually, the rest of the teams whittled down until only Loki and Nightcrawler were still in. It soon became apparent that the real battle was between those two; they were simply too fast and agile for anyone to catch, even without Loki revealing himself once more to be a double or Kurt vanishing in mid-air right before a snowball struck him. Kurt teleported with a series of loud cracks all over the battlefield, chasing down false Lokis, only to have the real one step out from behind an illusion of a tree and pelt him with a snowball in the side. Kurt scowled and shook snow out of his curly hair, steam rising gently from his skin in the waning light.

"That's two hits! One more and you're out, Kurt!" Rogue called helpfully from the sideline.

Kurt ignored her, his sharp golden eyes roving all over the battlefield. He was gradually learning to tell the real Lokis from the false ones, and could ignore those as decoys. A flicker of movement caught his eye, and he saw Loki - the real Loki, he could tell by the way the skin shaded blue around the hands and ears and nose - slinking along the last remains of Bobby's ice fortress, a solitary snowball held in his hands.

"That may be, but Herr Loki has only one snowball left!" Kurt called out. "He'll have to be very lucky!"

Loki whipped around at the sound of his voice, eyes narrowing as they zeroed on Kurt. "Luck has nothing to do with it," he said, his voice seeming to come from everywhere and nowhere; the fact that it didn't appear to come from his position only made Kurt more sure that this was the real Loki. Then the god's hand shot out and the snowball was winging towards him, as swift and accurate as a thrown knife. Kurt laughed aloud; now Loki was unarmed! Before the snowball could reach his position, he _bamfed_ out of sight.

As soon as Kurt vanished from sight, Loki let the illusory snowball disperse. He held very still, waiting; the instant he felt the warning tingle of magic behind him, he spun like a dancer and planted the last snowball squarely in Kurt's face.

"Aaaaand that's the game!" Rogue shouted.

Kurt staggered back a step, spitting snow and blinking, and then fell on his tail in a snowbank. He looked up at Loki with snow framing his eyelashes, astonished. "You beat me!" he said, surprised admiration in his tone.

Loki smiled, and offered his hand to pull Kurt out of the snowbank. Now that the battle was over, the rest of the students were beginning to creep back onto the field. "Do not feel bad," he said magnanimously. "I was surviving battles for centuries before you were even born. I would be most wroth with myself if I _couldn't_ best you."

Kurt shook his head, chuckling ruefully, and Loki gave him a friendly slap on the back, dusting snow from his clothes.

"You are quite formidable in close combat," Loki told his friend. "Your trick of high-speed teleportation is invaluable."

"But you turned it against me," Kurt said, smiling. "You set a trap for me!"

Loki had heard these words - or some variation on them - more times than he could care to count while sparring with the other warriors of Asgard. But unlike those red-faced, scowling warriors, there was no hint of anger or accusation in Kurt's tone; he sounded genuinely impressed. Enough so that Loki was moved to part with a piece of advice - one that might keep him and his friends alive someday.

"Yes. I had some time at the beginning of the battle to observe your tactics, and adapt to them. Never turn down a chance to study your enemy." Loki glanced up, and realized that the rest of the mutant students had gathered around the two of them, listening closely. "And don't forget that the same goes for your opponents, too. It is all very well and good to develop your strengths, but if you only ever learn to do one thing, your enemy _will_ eventually find a strategy to counter you. Be flexible - be unpredictable - and always have more than one trick up your sleeve."

The gathered crowd of mutants sent up an impressed murmur, and Loki couldn't help but preen a little. This - being looked up to, having his skills and accomplishments admired, having his words taken as wisdom - was all he could have ever asked for.

A _halloo_ from downslope broke into the conversation, and Loki looked over to see Hank waving from the edge of the clearing where the snow battle had taken place. "All right, guys, you should probably come inside now," he called up to them.

He got a chorus of _aww nooos_ in response, and Hank shook his head and tsked. "It's getting dark fast, and Storm is going to call up some clouds," he said, pointing one furry hand towards the sky. It was true, a bank of dark heavy clouds with suspiciously fleecy undersides were rapidly creeping up from the eastern horizon. "She plans to have it snow all night so that the slopes will be fresh for everyone tomorrow morning."

With that promise of more fun to come, the students were willing enough to troop back towards the lodge, leaving the site of the snow-battle - now mostly swept bare of snow, and with deep gouges driven into the ground beneath - to the swiftly falling darkness.

It was already flurrying again by the time Loki got to the lodge, and the sun had dipped behind the ridge of the mountains to leave a serene twilight of dancing snowflakes. Inside the lodge was cheery and bright, packed with raucous students and harried teachers. Despite encouragement to shake off their boots and scarves and coats outside, the floor was covered in puddles as snow melted in the heat of the lodge.

Over by one end of the hall, a few teachers were involved in the unpacking and distributing of some type of food; the sharp-sweet smell of it drifting through the heated air to assail Loki's nose. Hank was running a station with a stack of cups and a huge red plastic keg on a table, dispensing draughts of a hot, spicy drink. He spotted Loki coming through the door and leaped nimbly over his table, dodging easily through the crowd to present a steaming mug of cider to Loki. With a smile and a wink, he darted quickly back to his station.

Loki retired over to the far end of the hall by the less-crowded fireplace, breathing deeply of the fragrant steam while the warm ceramic mug heated his fingers. It smelled fruity and sweet, and a cautious sip of it turned out to be hot apple cider - not fermented, he supposed that was only to be expected in a crowd of such mixed ages, but tangy and delicious all the same.

The party atmosphere of the room increased, the voices growing louder and more rowdy as food and cider were passed around. One student over in a far corner even dug out an ipod and a flimsy pair of speakers, and tinny music began to blare throughout the hall. Loki felt a sudden wave of nostalgia sweep over him, taking him back to countless such festival nights in Asgard. Such nights had been full of fire and fragrant smoke, good wine and good food, music and dancing which Loki had often escorted his mother a turn around the fire.

And never would again.

Hard on the heels of nostalgia crashed a choking wave of depression, so sudden and severe that it almost seemed to darken the light and dim the sound around him. He stared down into the dark-red depths of his mug, feeling the grief and resentment and loss pour over him like a waterfall, and hating himself as much for feeling it as he hated the hurt for existing. Why _now,_ when everything was going right? Why on such a wonderful day, so full of fun and adventure and friends, did this black spectre insist on coming to haunt him?

Sometimes it seemed like he would never be rid of it, never be truly well again. No matter how far he fled, it would always dog its heels, dragging the shadow in to infect the whole company. And wasn't it just to be expected? He was Loki and he destroyed everything he touched - even happiness.

Loki stood up abruptly from the armchair and flung the contents of the mug into the fire, eliciting a wet hissing sound and a wave of fragrant smoke. He turned on his heel and marched towards the door, and every student who got a look at his face fell daunted out of his path.

Outside full dark had fallen, the wind blowing drifts of soft white flakes around with a soft soughing noise. Loki walked away from the noise and light of the lodge, his boots leaving deep prints in the snow that already began to fill in as he watched.

He climbed the hill behind the lodge, slipping a little in the new snow, until he reached the ridge overlooking the back of the building. There he stood for a long time, staring down at the snow-decked lodge with its brightly shining lights. It looked like something unreal, something from another world, picture-perfect in the falling snow. His breath did not mist in the cold.

After some time, he heard the soft crunch of footsteps over the snow, and a dark shape appeared in the swirling snowfall beside him. Loki glanced over and caught a flash of yellow eyes out of the silhouette; it was Kurt.

The young mutant came to a stop beside him and crouched down in the snow, apparently perfectly comfortable just to sit here as long as Loki did. "You left the hall so suddenly," he said, in explanation for his appearance. "I thought I would come to see that you are all right.

"I'm fine," Loki said, brushing off the younger man's concern. "What about you? You should not stay out too long in the cold."

Kurt shrugged. "I am fine for now. I have a good coat, sturdy boots and warm gloves. I will need to go in eventually, if I am not moving around and keeping myself warm, but not yet."

Loki nodded without speaking. Technically he ought to force the mortal to head back to shelter now - but he was loath to give up the company, the silent comfort of his presence.

At length, Kurt stirred. "When I was growing up - with the circus - we moved often," he said. "Many times we would be on the road even during winter, during terrible cold and storms. It was a hard life for a child, walking along beside the wagons - we could not ride, you see, because we had to spare the animals.

"But as we walked my mother would keep out a sharp eye for the plants and weeds by the roadside, or travel miles extra going to forage in the meadows off the track. So that when the time came for us to stop and make camp at night, she would be able to make my favorite tea. Sitting at her side, close to the fire around the camp, and drinking sips of that hot tea..." Kurt trailed off, staring into the darkness as though looking back across the years.

He sighed longingly. "No matter how hard things were in those years, I will never forget how safe and happy I felt in that moment. How loved. The fire inside made me think of that, for a time." He turned to face Loki, his eyes glowing in the darkness. "What did it make you think of?"

Loki could have brushed him off, given him some excuse... but he knew what Kurt was really asking for: memory for memory, a hard truth for a painful truth. He had never known privation like Kurt's in his childhood, never known hunger or cold or thirst - but in this, they both shared a loss. He took a few moments, searching in his mind for pieces and fragments, and after a few moments he began to speak.

"My mother... my mother was Queen of Asgard, the patron of hospitality," he began. He wasn't sure he could explain just what that meant to Kurt, just how much it had defined her identity and her duties as queen. "On Jul and festal days it was up to her to coordinate the grand feasts, balls and dances that fills the halls of Gladsheim.

"She had to do a million things: make sure the decorations were in place, that the great floors were spotless and shining, that all the food was properly cooked and brought out in a timely manner - have you ever seen how much a hall full of Aesir warriors can eat? It's like watching a natural disaster." Loki gave an exaggerated shudder, remembering the carnage.

Kurt laughed, and Loki smiled along with him, but the smile faded as he continued. "Guests greeted and made welcome, never made to feel slighted, musicians, diplomats, politics and drama... And yet in all that circus, she never failed to make time for us. Two little princes, hip-high and always underfoot, with no place in the grand parties and important councils between the races of the realms.

"No matter how busy she was she never, ever failed to find time to spend with us, to give us plates of our favorite foods, with candies from Alfheim and Vanaheim that we never got the rest of the year... and bring us glasses of wine - liberally watered down with fruit juice, of course - to join in the toasts as though we were numbered among the warriors."

He stared into the swirling darkness, feeling the memory throb inside him, the loss and longing more of a dull ache than a sharp pain now. His vision blurred, and he blinked to clear it, leaving a thin tracing of frost across his cheeks. "And when the hour grew late and the logs burned low, even as the parties grew more raucous than ever, she would appear to carry us to bed, to tuck us in and murmur spells to muffle the terrible noise in our ears so that we could sleep soundly. For all that she was a queen and politician and hostess, she never forgot to be our mother."

Kurt said nothing for a long time, only sitting there and offering his warm presence. Loki stared straight ahead, occasionally brushing his fingers over his eyes to dislodge snowflakes and frozen beads of tears.

"There is one thing that I envy you for," Kurt said at last, his voice soft and melancholy.

Loki turned to look at him. "And what's that?"

Kurt glanced up at him. "It is said that a person is never truly gone, so long as they are remembered by someone who loved them," he said. "You are immortal; I am not. You will have many more years to remember your mother than I have to remember mine."

Loki bit his lip, feeling the gap of years between them like a sudden shock. It was hard to remember that Kurt was so young, that he had lived for barely a handful of years before Loki had met him, and would likely die after only a handful more. "Doesn't more years just mean more time for pain?" Loki said, his voice choked slightly.

"Maybe," Kurt conceded. "But, I believe that the pain fades before the love does."

Loki made a soft sound that could be agreement, or at least hope.

The two of them shared a comfortable silence, caught on the snowy hillside between the rising smoke and the falling snowflakes. Below them, the lodge sat in quiet slumber, the many darkened windows peering out like shuttered eyes into the darkness.

"Kurt," Loki said thoughtfully, staring down at the smooth, virgin stretch of undisturbed snow leading up to the lodge. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"I think so, Loki," Kurt replied brightly, "but where would we get a snowdozer and twenty feet of scaffolding at this time of night?"

Loki turned to look at his companion, a grin stretching his lips until he thought his face would split. A rare sensation of warm wickedness was bubbling up inside him, a delight that he had not found in mischief in tricks in far too many years. "I think," he purred, his mind already racing ahead to the possibilities before them, "we can improvise."

* * *

Allison woke up slowly, groggily. She was still tired from the long trip and snow battle of the day before, but the unfamiliar surroundings of the lodge and the stuff, slightly scratchy bedding discouraged her from drifting back to sleep. The light coming in through the window was dim, so it couldn't be too late in the morning yet...

She glanced at her watch on the bedside table, letting off a soft cascade of sparks to illuminate the face. It was almost nine AM.

Allison struggled out of her cocoon of bedding and got to her feet, staggering over to the drawn curtains on the window. No, the light was _too_ dim - the tint and shadows were all wrong for a cloudy day. She yanked the curtains apart, opening the window wide, and then shrieked as she came face to face with an eyeball the size of a piano.

* * *

Down in the cozy comfort of the hall, Loki smiled to himself as the lodge began to come awake and a variety of noises paid tribute to last night's efforts. Another female scream, a hoarse male yell of surprise, and then further away, a burst of hysterical female laughter.

Looming over the ski lodge, visible from every window, was the huge, distorted face of an eldritch horror - made entirely of snow. It was also _only_ the face, and the snowbank sloped off rather sharply on the other side from the lodge, but it was enough to sustain the illusion at first glance. Loki had had the idea, but Kurt had supplied many helpful contributions and inspirations, and together they'd managed to design it so that each and every bedroom window would look out upon a bulging eyeball, a snowy tentacle, or an icy stalactite-filled maw of teeth.

It had taken them nearly until dawn to complete it. Loki had wanted to add a few final flourishes with magic - adding color and texture to the blank white slate, perhaps, or maybe make it move a little - but Kurt had discouraged the idea. They only wanted to _surprise_ their classmates, he insisted, not genuinely traumatize them. Given the potential for disaster inherent in presenting too realistic an enemy to a building full of variously-destructive mutants, a disappointed Loki had acquiesced.

The slam of a door near the end of the hallway heralded Ororo's descent into the common room, her white hair flattened askew and a murderous expression in her pale eyes. She spotted Kurt, perched on a bench and munching complacently on an apple, and zeroed on him with terrifying fury. "Kurt Wagner!" she shouted, her piercing voice rising over the hubbub of reactions from upstairs. "Was this _your_ doing?"

"Me?" Kurt's golden eyes widened with almost comical innocence, and his voice held just the right note of incredulous disbelief. "Why would you think this has anything to do with me?"

"Because whenever there's some kind of stupid, thoughtless practical joke at the school it has your name on it somewhere!" Ororo snapped, as students began to trickle down into the common room, some still in their pyjamas.

Kurt looked deeply wounded by the accusation. "I had absolutely nothing to do with it whatsoever," he lied blatantly. "How would I have moved so much snow in such a short time? Besides, if you are looking for a culprit who plays tricks with snow and ice, don't you think you should _start_ with the one who has an elementary mastery of it?"

"It's true," Loki joined in, keeping his voice and expression bland, "I didn't see much of Mister Drake after a certain point yesterday evening. Where was he all night, anyway? Does anybody know?"

Bobby flushed bright red with mortification and began sputtering denials; Rogue, Loki noticed, flushed just as bright a red. There _was_ someone who knew where Bobby had been most of the night, but he doubted either of them would be in a hurry to say just what they had been doing instead.

Ororo, whose righteous anger was apparently as easily led as Thor's had ever been, turned her wrath on this new target. Loki met Kurt's eyes across the room, and the dark mutant flashed him a discreet thumbs-up sign.

Eventually, no doubt, they would own up to their part in last night's activities - the snow golem was simply too artistic to deny credit forever. But in the meantime, Loki settled back with his book on the sofa before the fire, and enjoyed the unfolding chaos.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just an FYI for my readers: there will be a bit of a wait before the next chapter. Not that I'm abandoning the fic, or even putting it on hiatus long-term -- but I thought this would be a pretty good stopping place, before we get to the finale (which will likely chapter break on a fairly major cliffhanger.) I want to take the time to work on a few other projects, including finishing up the Secret Project I've been chipping away at since last November! Once those are out of the way, I can write out the glorious conclusion of the Saga of Professor Loki. So, until then -- ciao, readers!


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Xavier's School for Mutants receive some uninvited guests, and Loki shows his true colors.

Loki walked into Charles' office and stopped in his tracks, because someone else was already in there. Charles sat behind his desk, as usual, but in a chair in front of the desk was another person - one of the students, Bobby Drake, Loki remembered from the winter training trip.

Had he misjudged the time? But no, Charles had sent him a message earlier that day, specifically asking him to come at eight-thirty. Perhaps Charles was involved in another session of training or discipline and it had run long. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt," he said, his mouth automatically providing the pleasantry he didn't particularly feel.

"Not at all. You are right on time," Charles said. He waved a hand in front of his desk, and Loki saw to his confusion that a second chair had been pulled up beside Bobby's. "Go ahead and sit down."

Slowly Loki approached the chair, his mind racing over possibilities. Up until now it had always been just the two of them for their sessions; he wasn't sure what to make of this break in routine. Bobby was not in any of his classes, and he had had no notable interaction with the boy since their return from the ski trip. They were passing acquaintances, nothing more.

Once he was seated, Charles started speaking. "Loki, I know you and Bobby have met a few times before," he said. "As you are perhaps aware, his particular mutation has to do with ice and cold - the creation, manipulation and shaping of such forces according to his will."

"That's why they call me the Iceman," Bobby said with a little laugh.

"Now, while his skillset may not completely overlap with yours - insofar as we even know yet what you are capable of in your natural form - I believe you have enough common ground to do some good," Charles continued. "Bobby is also an auxiliary X-Men, meaning that he has used his powers in combat on occasions before and almost certainly will again."

" I see. You wish for me to teach Bobby how to better wield his ice in battle." Loki gritted his teeth against a rising surge of mortification. Was this how it was to be, then? That because of his unfortunate accident of birth, they could _make use of him_ for any ice or snow-related matters? Did they just _assume_ that because he was a Frost Giant, he would know such things?

He forced himself to lift his chin and say, cold and regal: "I am afraid to say that I will not be much help whatsoever. My 'natural form,' as you call it, is still an enigma to me - I have little to no control over its elemental abilities. From what I've seen, Mister Drake's control over ice far surpasses anything I would be able to teach him."

"Yes." Xavier's gaze bore into him, calm and steady. "Which is precisely why I want him to teach _you_."

Loki sat back slightly, barely managing to keep a smooth poker face over his initial reaction of shocked indignation. _I, to be taught by a mortal child? I,_ _a warrior of Asgard, a Prince of the Nine Realms, to be schooled by some human stripling? Did you truly expect me to submit myself to such a humiliation?_

Charles shook his head. "It does not make you less to admit that you still have things yet to learn," he said. "The only embarrassment is to stop learning, whether out of misplaced pride or out of fear. By doing so we become smaller. Only by constantly pushing our boundaries can we hope to grow."

Bobby spoke up. "I'm really looking forward to working with you, Mr. Loki," he said. "I don't meet many people who have the same powers as me. I'm sure it's gonna be a lot of fun practicing with ice together, and see what new things we come up with."

The boy was so _earnest._ Loki looked at him with distaste, not so much for the child himself as for the shining eagerness that spilled off his face in every direction. Bobby tried a bright smile on Loki, and when he saw he had Loki's attention, he held out his hand with the palm up. The skin of his hand frosted over, turning hard-white and shining-blue, and a seed of ice began to grow in his palm.

The shard of ice sprouted upwards, splitting into even, symmetrical trunks and branches. With some surprise, Loki recognized the stylized diagram of Yggdrasil that he had given to the students of his cosmology class - someone must have passed along a copy to Bobby. And he had been interested enough to memorize the illustration, and learn how to create it out of his own medium.

The familiar sight of the Tree eased him past his initial snarl of defensiveness, of instinctive rejection. "I suppose," he allowed, "that a weapon I have not mastered is a weapon in the hands of my enemy. If I'm going to learn from anyone, I suppose you are not the worst teacher I could hope to have."

Bobby's smile widened despite the backhanded compliment, and Loki took a seat across from Bobby in front of the desk. _To make beauty out of such a base and graceless thing... he has true talent_ , Loki mused privately. _Mother would approve of such a thing, would want to teach it to me if she could. Even if she cannot see it, I can go on learning, in her name._

From his seat behind the desk, at the edge of the bubble of attention between the two students, Charles Xavier smiled.

* * *

Life at the school returned to normal, caught up in the endless hectic seven-day cycle. A thaw came, melting the remains of snow and ice, and the ground lay wet and bare for a few weeks before spring began to poke its first green sprigs out of tree branches and mudflats. A series of cold spring storms drove students and teachers huddling in raincoats across the campus from shelter to shelter; during one Thursday workshop Cecilia was heard to comment wistfully on when Ororo would be back in New York to bring some sunshine.

During the brief periods of fair weather, Loki and Kurt conspired to bring some excitement back to the restless campus. It became something of a game for them, at least taking turns if not necessarily in direct competition, seeing who could create the most or best disruption to the otherwise staid school. Kurt used his superior knowledge of computer and smart-phone technology to develop a clever program that would randomly hack into students' phones and cause them to make loud pig-snorting noises at inappropriate times, such as in dining halls or the lectures of particularly stern professors. Loki in turn managed to unsettle a great many of the faculty by causing several of the solemn marble busts and statues around campus to snore.

At other times, they worked together. Some discreet local inquiries to local business enabled them to procure a set of goats, which then displayed an astonishing (perhaps unnatural) capacity to climb walls and buildings and bleat loudly, which were then set loose on the campus green. There were four of them, and at Kurt's suggestion they were adorned with signs around their neck reading 1, 3, 4, and 5. The teachers searched for _hours_ looking for number two. Loki was still snickering as he took to bed that night.

Although nothing was said aloud, it was almost certainly Kurt who managed to fill the entire men's bathroom outside the auditorium from floor to ceiling with quicksetting green jello. But any ire that was directed his way was quickly distracted when the main dining hall's roof spontaneously caught fire, and burned for an entire day without producing any heat or smoke or destroying its apparent source of fuel. After several hours of water and foam failed to make a dent in the fire, the students gave up and had their dinner normally under the merry conflagration. More than one teacher complained to Charles Xavier at that point, but he pointed out that no damage had actually been done, except perhaps to people's tempers.

The lighthearted pranks helped ease some deep itch within Loki that he hadn't even realized had gone unfulfilled, and despite the frequent torrents of rain, he found himself almost... relaxed at Xavier's school during the spring semester. The crushing burden of malaise and depression he'd felt during the winter was gone, and looking back on it he was almost shocked by his own behavior at the time, the twisting unreason of his thoughts. He had let himself be pulled into a self-defeating spiral of negativity, focusing obsessively on all the worst possibilities. The truth of the matter was that while Thor and Asgard still thought him dead, he was more free than he ever had been before; with a small effort of disguise he could travel anywhere in the Nine Realms that pleased him, even on Midgard. If he did not, if he lingered at Xavier's school as March passed into April and crept towards May, it was not because he was imprisoned here but because he... felt settled there.

And yet, still remained a lingering sense of discontentment. He enjoyed teaching, enjoyed being the center of the students' attention and imparting his knowledge to the uninformed. He enjoyed the little societies he had formed with Hank and Jean and the other teachers, with Kurt and Kitty and the other students. And he enjoyed the little pranks and games that he played when the restless itching crept up on him. Yet still, when he took a step back and looked at his surroundings, he was dissatisfied.

That restlessness frightened him on some level. Could he never truly be happy, anywhere, not even here? Was he truly destined to a life of destruction and mayhem, no matter what Xavier said - would he never be happy with anything else? Or was there something else out there for him, something that he had just never thought of or never tried, always hovering elusively beyond his reach? Did he linger here because he was happy, or because he was afraid to reach for more?

Who was he, Loki, when he was at home in himself? Not Loki of Asgard, not Loki of Jotunheim; but not Loki of Midgard either, not yet. Not a monster, yet not a hero; Xavier insisted there were other paths, other choices that he could make. Until he could clearly see his way to set foot upon those other paths, he was loath to leave what he had here. But he also knew he could not stand still much longer. He could not _stand_ to be still much longer.

* * *

As the last week of April wound down, the school campus seemed oddly subdued. Most of the part-time student body had returned home for the weekend, leaving only the full-time residents, and even they were quieter than usual in a frenzy of last-minute studying for exams. Loki himself was faced with the perplexing problem of having to craft his first-ever 'final exam' to give to his students. He'd never taken a written 'exam' himself; while growing up his tutors had always drilled him remorselessly on his studies until he'd exhausted every scrap of his knowledge on the topic. (As the years had gone by and his store of knowledge had grown, the examinations had also grown in length and scope; the last one he'd had with his magic tutor had lasted thirty-six hours before the tutor had admitted defeat and thus graduated him.)

But with nearly fifty students per class, there was no way he was going to have time to do that kind of one-on-one evaluation with every student. He was going to have to create some sort of standardized test for the students to complete on their own, a prospect that irritated him immensely. Every student learned different things in different ways; how could one generic exam possibly hope to adequately plumb the depths of their knowledge?

For his introduction to cosmology class Loki had considered requiring each student to draw and label a map of the Tree and illustrate one major historical event for each Realm. Cecilia had objected on the grounds that not all students were talented at drawing. Loki pointed out that not all students were talented at writing, either, so why should an exam format cater to one type of student over another? Cecilia had not managed to come up with an answer for that one.

He would have asked his other friends for advice, but the faculty was almost as bare as the student body right now. All of the active X-Men had been called out to cover the unrest on the western coast. The only member of the X-Men that had been on campus for more than a few hours at a time was an uncouth wildman who called himself Logan, who had showed up one evening on the back of a motorcycle to visit Anne-Marie, gotten into an altercation with the campus parking enforcement officer, and left in a huff without his motorcycle the same day.

Xavier, too, had left the previous day on some business with Director Fury. Loki had no fond feelings towards the man at all, but he was hardly in a position to begrudge Xavier lending his aid, since without that professional relationship he himself would never have ended up here. Even reserve members such as Jean and Hank had been called out to other duties; from Loki's understanding, they had gone to Washington, D.C. to attend debates on pending anti-mutant legislation and argue against it. This left the canteen rather echoingly bare on Thursday nights, and Loki had taken to spending that evening reading quietly in his apartment instead, telling himself firmly that he was _not_ sulking over it.

He heard it long before he consciously took notice of it, a sort of distant humming that came in through the partly-open window. It grew steadily louder until Loki's attention was pulled away from his book, and he looked up, frowning at the air as he tried to place the noise. Now that he bent his attention on it he could make the vibrating roar of one of Midgard's internal combustion engines, together with a rhythmic beating of air that he did not recognize. It did not sound quite like the X-Jet (whose comings and goings he had gradually gotten used to, over time) but there was the same whistle of rapidly moving air. If not a plane flying overhead, what could it be?

The roaring sound increased rapidly until it was almost deafening; a howl of wind passed directly overhead and off into the distance on the other side of the building. Loki cast his book aside with a scowl and got to his feet, quickly donning a coat and a pair of boots. He didn't know who would be flying so low or so loudly over the campus, but he meant to find out who it was and give them a piece of his mind. Possibly a few broken bones as well.

As soon as he emerged from his apartment, Loki realized that something was wrong. The roar of engines had stopped, but the silence left in their wake was not the usual quiet hush of the campus. It was a tense silence, a waiting silence, filled with tiny faint noises that were just beyond the threshold of understanding even for his exceptional hearing.

He began walking in the direction he'd heard the engines. Without thinking, his stance shifted into a hunter's walk, a near-silent gait that placed his steps precisely and without sound. His apartment lay on the eastern side of the campus; faintly he could hear the sound of engines again, not from the direction he was heading but from the south and the northwest.

Movement caught Loki's eye, and he zeroed in on a cluster of moving figures down a walkway to the left. Three men, wearing black textured clothing that covered their heads, part of their faces. Uniforms? Definitely armor. He didn't recognize any of them and, the closer he got, the more sure he was that they were not mutants. The group made a triangle formation about a smaller figure in the center; they were escorting... no, _dragging_ a young man whom Loki very barely remembered seeing around the cafeteria at mealtimes.

They were not X-Men. They were not even mutants. They had no business being here, doing this. Loki's steps quickened, his hand flexed as he thought of the weapons he could call to his hand in an instant's thought. "Hey!" he called out, his voice carrying sharp and hard across the open courtyard. "Let him go! _Now!"_

The black-clad figure closest to him released his hold on the boy and spun around, but only so he could use both hands to raise and steady a long-barreled black weapon that Loki didn't recognize. The other three did not release their hold on the young mutant. Loki's hand twitched, thickening the air in front of him into a shield, and his muscles tensed as he prepared to charge -

A hissing noise from behind and to the side was his only warning, and Loki whirled around too late as he felt a sudden jarring impact on his side, below his ribs. There was a sharp pinching sensation in his stomach, and his hand flew to his side to discover a cluster of small, wicked darts standing out from his skin. A few of the darts had caught on his clothing and not penetrated, but nearly half a dozen of them had dug firmly into his flesh.

Loki snarled and turned to meet this new threat, but a sudden sickening wave of sensation overtook him, starting from the site of the wound but spreading outwards like fire catching in a sheet of paper. It was hot and cold and nausea all at once, and Loki stumbled and nearly went to his knees as the world skewed crazily around him. He was freezing and burning all at once, the air around him felt too hot but there was ice running through his veins -

A flash of blue caught the corner of his eye, and Loki turned his head and stared in horrified fascination as the skin of his hands seemed to writhe and undulate, pale pink washing out of them like pink dye and replaced by cerulean blue, broken by jagged lines. His true skin. His _jotun_ skin.

It was not like Loki had not seen this before, he had taken on this form a dozen times or more since he had come to this school, often for no more a trivial reason than to emphasize a point or to blend in with those around him. But that was different, _this_ was completely different, because always before now Loki had _chosen_ to change. Not since the Frost Giant had grabbed his arm in the disastrous battle on Jotunheim had his skin shifted against his will, out of his control, but it did now. Someone had _forced_ this change on him, unwanted, had taken mastery of his very flesh and bones away from him and twisted it to their liking.

And he could not change back, no matter how he tried. Not only could he not force his skin Aesir again, could not force the lines to smooth and disappear, but he could not shift into _anything._ In a growing panic he tried one form after another, practiced disguises and skins that he had worn hundreds of times over the years, but his flesh remained stubbornly unaltered. Someone, somehow had reached down inside him and robbed him of his most instinctive and natural powers.

 _They came prepared,_ the thought crossed his mind as he stared stupidly at his unchanging hands. _They knew better than to attack this place without a weapon that could negate the unpredictable powers of their enemies. Now, with this weapon, they face no more than any other mortal children._ And, carried in on the tail end of that thought, completely out of place for the gravity of the situation, _Does that mean that it's true after all that my powers come from the same source as theirs? That it's true that I, too, am a mutant?_

Time seemed to stretch out like cold honey, clear but viscous, but in reality it was probably only a few seconds that he stood there staring at his hands and _panicking._ That's what it was, as humiliating as it was to admit it, that he froze up like a green warrior on his first battlefield.

But then a dark figure was lunging at him, a short staff swinging towards his face with some kind of crackling electricity at the end of it. Loki's battle-hardened reflexes kicked in and his arm swept upwards, catching the downstroke on the meat of his forearm. A buzzing shock traveled through the cloth of his coat into his arm, but compared to some of the jolts of electricity Loki regularly collected just living in the same _house_ as the God of Thunder, it hardly did more than tickle.

The blow did serve to jolt him out of his horrified preoccupation, snapping him back to the immediate reality of combat. More black-clad figures were starting to move towards him, drawing more of the batons that hummed and crackled with energy, and Loki nearly laughed aloud at their foolish - lethally foolish - mistake.

Three of them rushed him, two from one side and one from the other, and Loki turned to place himself between them. A roundhouse kick towards the lone one sent him flying through the air to crash against the wall of the nearest building, hundred pounds of armor and all. He grabbed the sword-arm of one of the others, momentarily immobilizing him, and almost negligently picked up the third man by the front of his armored jacket, arcing him over his head and face-down onto the concrete pavement with a bone-crunching smash. The second man tried to throw something in his face, some kind of gas or powder that Loki got a lungful before he could avoid it; but unlike the first round of darts, these seemed to have no effect on him, so he ignored it.

"Why won't you go down, freak!" screamed the soldier Loki was immobilizing, fear rendering his hoarse voice, and Loki grinned a death's-head smile. A quick, casual blow to his solar plexus knocked the wind out of him and left him gasping helplessly for air, diaphragm paralyzed. He dropped the man in a heap on the pavement and stepped forward.

After seeing his comrades go down, the mercenary dropped his dart gun and scrabbled at his holster for another short-barreled weapon - this one gleaming and deadly. Loki made a gesture with one hand in the air and suddenly there were three of him, all Jotun-skinned and sinisterly smiling, stepping and shifting positions as they advanced. The man hesitated, the tip of the barrel wavering from one target to another; he let off one desperate shot, but the missile passed through thin air as one of the reflections winked out.

Loki's smile widened, bloodthirsty and exultant, as he charged the remaining distance in a flash. His hand shot out to grip the barrel of the gun and crushed it in his hand, warping and deforming the metal with a screech. "Is that really all that you have?" he asked contemptuously, spitting the words in the man's face before he yanked the grip out of its owner's hand and cast it spinning to the concrete. "What kind of fight were you preparing for? Did you think you would be facing only children, vulnerable and weak?"

He slammed the man violently against the ground and stepped past him, ignoring the wet stain that spread across the pavement from under his former enemy's body. "Did you not expect that any of your foes would be able to stand against you?" Loki shouted, his volume increasing along with his momentum, striding forward and calling a bladed spear to his hand. "That was your last mistake; for you face a true warrior now, and I have within me no more mercy than you brought to this place with you!"

The last man dropped his gun and tried to scramble away, terrified, but Loki pursued him relentlessly. He slammed one boot on the ground on the man's leg, wringing a scream from his lips and trapping him in place like a bug on a pin. Loki drew back his weapon, preparing to send the man's head bouncing across the green, when a familiar voice in his head shouted _"Loki, no!"_

Loki rocketed to a halt, hand still upraised with the blade in his grasp. He knew that voice, it was intimately familiar to him after all these months on Midgard; and he knew it just as well when it spoke inside his head as without. But how could this be? _"What? Xavier? What is this?"_ he answered back, confusion mixing with the anger that still pulsed through his veins. Charles Xavier was not here, he had traveled to the capital for the next few days; these scum would never have dared invade the school otherwise, not while they still had Xavier's power to contend with.

Charles couldn't have returned from Washington so soon, not with so little warning of the attack. He must be projecting his mind across the miles, then, to place his words in Loki's head. It was a chilling reminder of just how powerful a telepath he really was, of just what he could do when he put his mind to it. _"Do not kill him, Loki,"_ Charles' voice echoed urgently between his ears. _"Do not kill any of them!"_

"Why not?" Loki asked aloud, not bothering to cage his voice within the confines of his head. The mortal in front of him cringed a little further, at this apparent proof that Loki truly was crazy, talking to the air in front of him. "They attacked your school! They would harm your students! They knew what might become of them when they picked up a gun and stepped on a battlefield. They invited this fate down on their heads!"

 _"Even if they did, I cannot let you kill them,"_ Charles replied, his voice heavy with sorrow and regret. _"No matter how justified your actions, all the rest of the country would see is mutant supporters murdering American soldiers in cold blood. It would destroy everything we have tried to build here, it would kill the future we dream of, the future of peace. It would mean war between mutants and humans."_

But a peaceful world between mutants and humans was not _his_ dream; he already knew it for a fantasy, even if Charles did not. "You are already at war!" Loki shouted. "Why don't you realize it? They struck first! It has already come to pass, so what more do you fear?"

 _"It's not only the school I fear for, Loki. It's you!"_ Charles said urgently, and Loki froze in place as the deep feelings of concern washed over him. _"You have come so far, you have nearly freed yourself from the trap of heroes and monsters. You made so much progress, and now you stand at the precipice where it could so easily all come undone._

 _"If you let them force you to kill now, they will never forgive you, and you will forever be a fugitive and a villain in the eyes of Earth,"_ Charles continued, and there was fear in his 'voice,' but not fear _of_ Loki - fear _for_ Loki. It had been so many, many years since anyone had been afraid _for_ Loki. _"You will never be free again. I can't let them do that to you. I will **not."**_

Loki snarled, fighting against the clinging threads of sentiment that threatened to wrap around him, hindering his limbs and weighing him down. "You expect me to just let them _go?!"_ he demanded incredulously.

 _"Do what you must to stop them, Loki. But no killing,"_ Charles importuned him. His voice was already fading, echoing in Loki's mind. _"I believe that you can do this. I'm on my way, and I've already contacted help, but they'll never make it in time. You're the only one who's close enough to make a difference. Please, Loki. This is my boon, the one you promised to me. Protect my students, but take no lives!"_

And then the voice, the phantasm, the presence of Charles Xavier was gone.

Loki threw his head back and screamed his rage, his frustrated bitterness to the sky. Hypocrites, all of them, righteous stinking _hypocrites._ It did not make one a monster, to kill one's enemies! They killed, all of them, Thor and Sif and Fandral and Iron Man and Captain America and all the rest, _they killed._ They killed aliens, they killed men, they killed their own kind without a moment's hesitation when the cause was _right._ What cause could be more just than this, than to raise one's sword in defense of children, against brigands who sought to abduct and despoil them? Why was _he_ rebuked, where others were glorified? Why was only _he_ made monster by it?

He brought his arm down and around, the blade whistling as it arced through the air towards the cringing mortal beneath him; at the last moment he changed the angle of the wrist so that he struck with the flat instead, slamming the long flat edge of the polearm across the man's upper thighs and breaking the long bones with a shattering crunch.

Not because the man deserved mercy - he didn't. Not because Loki was particularly inclined to give it - he wasn't. But Charles Xavier had asked this of him, and Loki would try with all his heart not to disappoint him.

Loki focused his will into the long bladed polearm, causing the metal to shift and flow and reform as a sturdy weighted staff instead of a pointed edge. It seemed he still had command of his magic, then; whatever vile venom they had used on him affected only his natural shapeshifting, not his innate strength or speed nor all the magic or martial training he had learned throughout his life. Good. That would make what was to come less somewhat easier.

To slay one's enemies was a feat worthy of renown - but to defeat one's enemies _without_ killing them was much, much harder, if less glorious. It was made harder only because there were so many ways to kill someone without entirely meaning to: a wound that gushed too freely and bled them dry, a blow to the chest or gut that caused fatal bleeding within, a broken nose that drove fragments of bone up into the brain. Three times as hard with these mortals, as fragile as they were: Loki didn't even know the first pack of mortals he'd taken down would survive their wounds, although he had not even been trying for a killing blow then. This was going to be tricky.

Fortunately, he was known for his tricks.

He turned to the student he'd freed, a sandy-curled teenage boy who was ash-pale and shaking with reaction. Whether it was reaction to the kidnapping he'd experienced or the violence he'd witnessed Loki didn't know, but there was no time now to coddle his inexperienced youth. "You, boy," he said, not knowing the student's name and not bothering now to ask. "Which way did they come from - did you see? Which way were they going? Where is the vessel they used to come here?"

The student pointed a trembling hand off down the walkway to their left; it was vaguely in the direction that Loki remembered hearing the engines from, so it would have to do. Loki frowned, his mind racing. He could not take the boy into battle with him, not without whatever powers he might normally have had to protect him; nor could he just leave him wandering out on the sidewalk. The dormitories were not safe right now, all dwelling places would be like honey to black flies of the invaders seeking prizes. The auditorium, cafeteria and other gathering places were likewise risky, until enough defenders could gather to secure them.

"Go towards the dining hall, but go around the back - avoid the front doors. There's a storage shed near the corner that is chained shut, but the door slides open the other way," Loki instructed him rapidly. "Hide in there and watch the entrance until you see other students and teachers come there, and then join them in defending the hall."

"But... the soldiers are still out there," the boy cried, catching at Loki's sleeve. "What if they see me? I tried to turn invisible, but I _can't,_ I just _can't!"_

Loki suppressed a frustrated growl; there was no time now for him to coddle one mortal child's insecurities. "I will give them something else to look at," he told the boy firmly, pulling his hand loose from Loki's sleeve and giving it a firm squeeze before dropping it. "Trust me."

And, incredibly, the boy did.

* * *

The quiet campus had turned into a battlefield, ringing with a cacophony of chaos. In every direction Loki could hear the high-pitched, distressed cries of his students, the barked commands of strange voices, and the thrum and whine of their machines. Even without the students' direction of the invaders' landing site, Loki's ears guided him right to it.

As he rounded the back of a building he saw it, perched on the grey asphalt surface of the courtyard like a black fly alight in a glass of wine. The flying vessel that the brigands had ridden in their attack on the school was an ugly thing: squat, bulging black metal, with none of the aquiline elegance and grace of Asgard's winged longboats. Above it, three long narrow blades beat the air in a steady staccato rhythm.

Black-clad men swarmed about the copter, like ants around a disturbed hill. Some of them were half-carrying, half-dragging injured comrades, to load aboard the vessel for transport; Loki was grimly pleased to see that not all of the injuries were his own handiwork. The other students were fighting back, then. Loki could do many things, but not even he could be everywhere on the campus at once.

Less pleasing were the two half-grown teenagers that were being dragged towards the black helicopter, struggling and scuffing against the ground. Loki hardly recognized Alison, Kitty's friend, without the subtle halo of light that normally surrounded her. Also being forced towards the helicopter was an older boy, long blond hair now streaming with blood from a cut on his scalp; Alison's boyfriend, Loki guessed. Likely they had been enjoying a pleasant spring day together among the green before being surprised by the attack.

One of the black-clad humans spotted him, and alerted the others with an urgent shout. In a moment a dozen metal barrels were pointed in his direction, and Loki let his mouth curve in a smile as he walked forward steadily, unhurriedly, even spreading his arms slightly to the side to make a wider target of himself. The bark and hiss of the muzzles filled the air, dozens of tiny metal darts and hard steel missiles flying towards him before being deflected by his shields.

Really, it never ceased to boggle Loki's mind how often humans could stubbornly keep firing their weapons even after it had become obvious that they were doing no good at all. Did they expect the results to magically change if they just kept shooting long enough?

He kept up his slow advance until the first guns began to click empty. In that moment, when the men began to panic but before they could decide on another course of action, he charged. They scattered in all directions, but not fast enough; he reached out and grabbed two of them, one by the neck and the other by the arm, and hurled the first across the empty lot to impact against the side of the building. The other, he took a moment to carefully dislocate the man's shoulder, then tossed him screaming to the ground and lunged for another.

It would have been all too easy to slaughter them, to slice their soft necks with a blade or puncture their chests to let out the air or incinerate them with a bolt of magic, but Loki could not do that. Instead he mostly concentrated on breaking bones, particularly arms or legs; shattering the ribs and collars would probably also keep them out of trouble, but there was always the risk of a splinter of bone cutting into the major arteries. The long bones of the upper arm or thigh were much safer, and they would pose little enough threat when they could neither walk nor wield a gun.

While Loki was diverted by this exercise, the steady thrum of the chopper's engines flared to a roar. The eddies of wind swirling about the courtyard increased to a hurricane, and Alison screamed "Arthur!" as the metal machine began to slowly separate from the ground. Loki whirled and leapt to catch hold of the side of the chopper, his weight yanking the vessel to the side and dragging it back down towards earth. But not for long; even unbalanced and weighted as it was, the chopper was slowly beginning to rise.

Loki braced one foot on the metal skid and grabbed hold of the edge of the doorway, pulling a little to test the give of the metal. Then in one quick movement he tore the metal door off its hinges and flung it to the ground, rocking the chopper and causing shouts of consternation from the men inside, forced to cling to straps and handrails so as not to fall out.

Now with a fair idea of the strength of the metal, Loki set about slowly tearing the vessel apart. The metal skin gave way easily enough, sending roaring drafts through the exposed interior of the chopper. The sturdy struts that made up the skeleton of the vehicle were made of tougher stuff, but a few blasts of balefire from his staff softened and deformed them until they too gave way.

After the first burst of hellish green fire, none of the soldiers inside the chopper made any attempts to approach. A few of them (the smarter few, Loki would give them that) even dived out the open doorway on the far side of the copter to the dubious safety of the ground below. The others, more stubborn, took a few shots at Loki from short, hand-held firearms whose bark was lost in the roar of the engines. The bullets bounced off Loki's shields, proving more a hazard to the ones who had fired them as they ricocheted off the interior of the small cabin. Loki ignored the shouts of rage and consternation that produced, and concentrated on steadily dismantling the copter.

He had the flying machine half-disassembled before he finally exposed the engines and pistons that powered the rotors. A few moments' study let Loki trace the flow of circuitry and hydraulics that made the machine fly, and from that he could gauge with fair certainty which ones were essential to its flight. He tore off a sagging piece of framework from above his head, and slammed it point-first into the howling motor.

With a near-deafening squeal of tortured metal burning slag, the helicopter lurched, jagged, and then spun out of control on the asphalt floor below. It shuddered a few more times before the engines gave out and the whole thing ground to a halt, a jagged pile of smoking wreckage.

* * *

As Loki turned away from the wreck of the helicopter and the field of downed enemies, he felt a warning tingle of familiar magic. A moment later, there was a soft _bamf_ as Kurt appeared out of the air beside him; so forewarned, Loki did not strike out at him. His heart lifted to know that Kurt, at least, seemed to have escaped the power-suppressing poison their enemies were spreading.

"Loki!" Kurt blurted out. He was in a rumpled set of what appeared to be powder-blue pajamas, and his hair was wet, blue-black curls plastered down against his skull. He looked wild and hunted, the whites showing around the rims of his eyes as he darted his glance around the courtyard. "Thank God I have found you!"

"Are you injured?" Loki demanded. Kurt shook his head.

"No, I... I saw figures moving outside my window and then the glass broke, so I teleported away. I thought I should get help, but I could not just leave everyone else behind. I have been searching for a safe place, looking for help... they are everywhere!" Kurt looked out over the wreckage of the battlefield, expression awed and disbelieving, but the sight of it seemed to calm him somewhat. "Harry told me he saw you, that you had gone to intercept the helicopter... I did not quite expect this."

"It is good that you are here," Loki told him, and it was true for more than just practical reasons; even if his preferred style of combat was a solo one, it relaxed his heart to know that he was not alone. "We must mount a counterattack."

"We? You and I alone?" Kurt looked torn between wild hope and daunted fearfulness.

"There will be others," Loki said confidently. "But we must rally them. That is where you come in. I will do what I can, but I cannot defeat this invasion myself. You must be my eyes."

"What do you want me to do?" Kurt asked.

"Teleport everywhere on the campus - into all your hidden places - and bring me news. How many of them there are, where they are, what weaponry they carry," Loki ordered him. "Bring me news of the other students, teachers, and anyone else left on the campus. And whatever you do, do not engage! If they get you with the same poison as the others, you will change very quickly from being combatant to hostage." He reached out and clasped Kurt on the shoulder, looking him straight in the eye. "And I cannot afford to lose you, my eyes and ears, so stay out of sight."

Kurt took a deep breath. "Yes, _Herr Lehrer,_ " he said, and vanished with a _crack._

A few minutes later he returned, bringing the smell of burning stone and news. "There is a helicopter on the north side of campus, on the terrace outside the coffee shop," he reported. "There were seven, maybe eight men around it, four of them were heading back to the east side."

Loki nodded grimly. "I will take care of that," he said. "Keep going, and find me as I go."

Kurt vanished again, and Loki set off towards the north quadrant. Kurt was gone longer this time, but he reappeared just as Loki was getting worried that the boy would not be able to track him. "I found the kitchen staff, lying on the floor just inside the door... they were breathing, but unconscious," Kurt said. "I think they were drugged."

It didn't surprise Loki that the brigands would wish to eliminate the adult staff on campus, although it pleased him to hear that they had not been killed. "Leave them where they are, for now," he said. "They are not in immediate danger, and we do not have the time to spare to tend to them more fully. I will try to avoid having any battles near that building." Kurt nodded, and teleported away again.

"Pairs of soldiers are prowling around the lecture hall and administration buildings," Kurt said on his next report. "I think they are looking for stragglers. They had more of the dart-guns and gas canisters."

"Do not get hit by them," Loki warned him, and Kurt flashed him a sharp bright grin as he vanished.

The boy was gone for some minutes after that, and Loki found and disabled two of the roving pairs of soldiers as he made his way to the coffee shop on the north side.

The awkward, clunky vessel sat on the courtyard like a malevolent spider, knocking the tables and chairs askew where it had landed on the pavement. Its presence by the coffee shop - _Loki's_ coffee shop, _Loki's_ space, _Loki's_ school - only fueled his irrational rage. A quick flicker of his senses assured him that the metal machine was empty, no sign of human or mutant life; and so he summoned a rush of energy to his hands and channeled it through his staff, launching a green-tinted bolt of balefire across the space between. The energy blast struck the helicopter and burst, disintegrating the glass cockpit and front runners and blowing the rest of the frame into shrapnel. _Two down._

Kurt reappeared as Loki turned away from the conflagration, winded and excited. "The boy's dormitory is surrounded by soldiers!" he said, words tumbling out of him almost before he fully appeared. "There are many - I could not count them all. It is a pitched battle! The students have blocked the windows and barricaded the doors, so that the soldiers can't throw anything in. The soldiers are trying to take down the barriers with axes, and the students drive them back when they get close."

"Only axes?" Loki asked.

Kurt shrugged. "Whether they don't have heavier equipment with them, or they don't want to risk using it, I do not know," he said. "Piotr is there, he leads them. He is in his metal skin, so they must not have gotten him with the poison. I don't know how many other students still have their powers."

"Enough to make it a fair fight, it sounds like." Loki smiled with approval.

"Loki, should we go join them?" Kurt said, looking at him with anxious pleading. Loki considered it, but then shook his head.

"If they need us we will go to their aid, but it sounds like they're holding their own, for now. We need to find out where the rest of the invaders are."

Kurt looked slightly disappointed, but he managed to recover quickly. "Ja, professor," he said with a quick salute, and vanished. Loki turned towards the student dormitory anyway, despite his words for Kurt. It was beginning to sound more and more that the main action was there.

He was proven right the next time Kurt returned, visibly agitated. "Loki, Loki, come quickly! They have broken into the girl's dormitory! The doors are in splinters and the front wall is blown down. They are dragging them away! Please help!"

Loki cursed and broke into a run. He should have known, he should have guessed what their target was. They had come to the school with force, but with nonlethal weapons - of course they would not be content merely to strip the mutants of their powers, but sought to seize and steal them from their beds, as well! And with the prize they sought, of course the halls housing the younger students would be their primary targets. More fool he was, he should have gone there first! And yet, he could not have left the two helicopters behind, a tempting open route for the raiders to retreat with their captives.

It was more than a mile across campus to the girls' dormitories, yet Loki sprinted there the entire way, a pace that would have winded most mortals. He rounded the last corner to see the girls' dormitory transformed, from the safe haven it had once been into a scene of nightmare.

Not only the front door but half of the wall beside it was missing, a gaping hole blown in the building; Loki could see the bare walls and support struts poke out towards the sky, where a good chunk of the roof was also gone. Through the wreckage strewn around the hole in the walls clambered dark-suited figures, many of them dragging smaller figures in their grip.

"Kurt!" Loki shouted as he rushed forward; he didn't need to say any more than that, as Kurt _bamfed_ out of sight beside him. His shout also had the advantage of drawing the attention of the brigands; they turned towards him, their weapons training onto him, and thus did not see the eruption of dark smoke behind them as Kurt reappeared, striking hard and fast. He was as quick and agile in real combat as he had been in the snow battle that seemed so long ago; flicking into existence long enough to land a few hard blows, then puffing out again as his opponents turned blindly to strike.

Yet turning their back to Loki was no less fatal of a mistake. He put one of them down with a hard blow to the back of his head from his staff, then swept the other end of the long stave around to pulverize the knee of a second, who went down screaming and clutching his leg. A third Loki grabbed and flung headlong across the field to end up headfirst in a pond.

But Loki could only take down those opponents he could reach, and only a brave foolish few of the raiders had tried to stand their ground against him. Others were already scattering away from them across the school, and thumps and shouting from within the half-demolished building warned him that there were yet more enemies inside.

Loki made his decision quickly. "Go after the stragglers," Loki told Kurt, who nodded agreement and _bamfed_ away. He turned back and strode through the ragged hole in the house, stepping over fallen girders and beams and jumping up to make the sixth step in the staircase, when all the ones below it had been blown away. He went up the staircase three at a time, rounded the banister at the top of the flight, then froze.

The sight beyond threatened to make his heart stop - two female students, both still clad in their nightwear, being manhandled by a pair of burly, black-clad raiders who held them in headlocks. Not only students - _Loki's_ students. He recognized them; one in pajamas, with a cloud of fuzzy brown hair and the other in a low-backed nightgown with sleek, ruler-straight hair above smooth-lidded eyes. Kitty and Tenko. Two of the first students at Xavier's school that Loki had ever met, that had ever become real to him - and now they were in danger.

" _Let them go,"_ he hissed, and the entire corridor rattled with the sound of his voice.

Both raiders jerked around in startlement, though their grips did not loosen. But even as they turned, Tenko suddenly came to life in her captor's arms: she slammed her heel down on her attacker's instep, then kicked back hard against his kneecap. A follow-up strike to the groin bounced uselessly off the man's armoring, but as he swore and tried to re-establish his grip on her, she wriggled one hand free and shot a fist up to connect with his nose. He howled and jerked his head back, blood flowing from his shattered nose, and Tenko wrenched herself out of his loosened grip and bolted across the hallway to the safety of Loki's side.

The soldier scrambled after her, swearing, but his outstretched hand met Loki's grip instead. He clamped down on the man's hand and wrist, crushing the bones in his grasp to splinters, and then yanked the man by his injured arm to tumble inelegantly down the stairs behind them. He landed with a _crunch_ of bone that sounded ugly, although if his continuing groans were any indication, Loki hadn't at least managed to kill him.

"Wow," Tenko muttered, her voice unsteady.

"Very good, Tenko," Loki whispered to her; but there was no time now for praise. Kitty hadn't moved when Tenko did, and her captor still had her. He had taken out one of the shock-batons in his right hand, and held it against Kitty's temple while his other arm circled her throat.

"I said it once, and I won't say it again," Loki said, heavy with menace as he stalked slowly forward. _"Let - her - go."_

"Stay back, freak," the soldier spat at Loki, tightening his grip on Kitty. "I said _\- stop._ One more step and this girl gets a shot of juice to the brain."

Loki stopped, his hands clenching on the staff. Kitty's breathing came in shallow flutters, and her eyes were glazed over with bright shock.

"What a hollow, impotent, witless shell of a man you are," Loki sneered, moving slightly and carefully to gather his magic. "It must sicken you to see your own reflection in the mirror, and know that you are the kind of gutless puke who would use a little girl as a shield."

"Maybe it would bother me, if this was a little girl," the raider shot back. "She's nothing but a freak of nature, a mistake of the universe."

"You have no idea what vengeance you are inviting upon yourself," Loki threatened, low and quiet. "If you kill her, there will be nothing to protect you from me."

The man laughed coarsely, and pressed his baton harder across Kitty's throat. "But _she'll_ still be dead. You've got a lot more to lose than I do, if I pull this trigger. I don't care about her life, but I knew you would, you sick freaks all stick toge -"

That was as far as he got in his monologue before Loki slipped out of the shadows behind him and struck, carelessly dispelling the illusion of himself he'd used to keep the man's eyes on him. The oldest and simplest of tricks, and he had fallen for it. The fool.

A brutal jab to the shoulder broke the man's grip and also his rotator cuff, sending his hand and blade flying and releasing Kitty to stumble free. Before the soldier could turn around Loki slammed the weighted metal staff with great precision against the man's spine, listening for the muffled _crunch_ of tearing tissue and collapsing bone. His aim was flawless and the force of his blow impeccably calculated, and the man shrieked and folded to the floor, flopping about as helplessly a fish on legs that had suddenly gone nerveless.

Loki had promised Xavier that he would not kill. He never promised that he would not maim or cripple, and this piece of scum had more than deserved it.

Kitty finally recovered from her fright, at least enough to stumble out of the range of her attacker until her back struck the wall.

"Are you hurt?" Loki demanded, putting his hands on Kitty's shoulders and peering intently into her face. For a moment she just stared at him, and Loki remembered for the first time since this had begun that he was still in his Jotun form. Did his appearance frighten her? Did she even recognize -

That train of thought was derailed a moment later, when Kitty flung herself into his arms and burst into tears. Loki patted her back awkwardly. "Katherine, did he hurt you? Because if he did, I swear -"

"I'm sorry!" Kitty cried. "I'm sorry I couldn't do anything, I, I, just _forgot._ Everything you tried to teach me, it just went right out of my head, it was a blank. I was so scared, I couldn't move, I couldn't _think._ I'm sorry I'm so useless, I'm sorry..."

Her words struck Loki as surely as a dart to the heart, and he pulled Kitty into his arms for an embrace despite the blood and grime that spattered his armor.

"Shh, no, no more of that," he told her, trying to temper his voice to soothe. "You have nothing to be sorry for, you have nothing to be ashamed of. Do you think you are the only soldier who, when the horns of first battle blare, freezes up and forgets their training? You are _not._ Many do, _most_ do, even if they do not wish to tell tales of it in later years, when they have become a great warrior. It is _why_ we drill them so hard, in hopes that their muscles may remember even when their minds forget."

"I just let him grab me," Kitty whispered miserably into his shoulder. "It's my fault, I was useless, it's my fault."

"It is _not_ your fault," Loki denied emphatically. "And you are _not_ useless. It is nothing lacking in you, Kitty. All that matters is that you survived, that you came out of your first battle alive." He pulled back from her, gripping her shoulders reassuringly, and then reached up to wipe away tears from her jaw. "And the next time - you will know what to expect, yes?"

Kitty blinked furiously at the tears, then nodded. "Y-yeah," she quavered.

"Professor, what should we do?" Tenko asked, hovering around nervously by their side. Loki noted with some shock that her wings, the beautiful glossy red-and-black wings that had graced her back before, were nowhere to be seen. The poison had forced him into his Jotun shape, all unwitting; had it done the same to those students whose mutations were a physical part of them, as well? Another reason to curse these brigands for their shameful attack, to force these disfiguring changes on the children unwilling. "They're - the men in black are getting away..."

A corner of Loki's mouth lifted in a snarl. "They may crawl off in disgrace if they wish - those who can still crawl, he said coldly. "I will not stop them from running away with their tails between their legs."

"But, Professor! They have Illyana!" Kitty blurted out, and Loki's heart turned to stone in his chest.

* * *

Loki heard the staccato roar of the helicopter engine as soon as he set foot outside the girl's dorm, saw the blurred crown of rotors as it lifted into the air - but too late, too far for him to reach, on the other side of a building and a line of trees. He sprinted towards the launch site as fast as he could, barely aware as he ran that there were others in pursuit alongside him.

He skidded to a halt in the field the helicopter had used as a launching pad and stopped, grinding his teeth in frustration as he watched the black copter lift over the treetops and away, far out of his reach.

For a moment he stood there, mind furiously racing, hands clenching and unclenching in fists. Something silver flickered in the corner of his vision; Piotr Rasputin skidded past him, throwing a brick with furious force at the disappearing copter. It fell far short, but that didn't stop him from grabbing a tree branch and hurling it after, running a few steps forward to scoop up a heavy stone and fling it as well. He was screaming profanities that Loki had never heard from the polite, mild-mannered young man before, curses that he hadn't even realized Piotr knew.

"Colossus, contain yourself!" Loki snapped. "You'll never reach them from here, and you could hurt students on the ground below."

"Bastards! Those rot-sucking, skull-fucking bastards!" Piotr screamed. He ripped another limb from the tree, but managed not to throw this one, slamming it instead with enough force to dig half its length into the ground. "They have taken her, they are getting away!"

As the black copter vanished over the treetops, he seemed to sag into himself, all his bulky menace collapsing into itself. "My Illyana, my sister, my little snowflake," he moaned. "I have failed you. I have failed you."

"Listen," Loki started, trying to find some words that would soothe the boy, calm him enough to be useful. "I understand how you feel..."

"How?" Piotr demanded, rounding suddenly on him instead. "I was supposed to _protect_ her! What can you know the pain of an older brother who has failed to keep his sibling safe?"

The question hit Loki like a blow to the gut, and he stood numb, without an answer. Piotr moaned, and slumped down onto the grass.

"How could this have happened?" Piotr whispered in disbelief. "The school was supposed to be safe! _She_ was supposed to be safe!"

The words fed a snarling anger that bubbled under Loki's ribcage, that had been growing there ever since the first helicopter had set down upon the school, that had only grown with each black-hearted brigand he had fought since then. How _dare_ they do this? How _dare_ they come to Xavier's school, this place of learning and nurturing, this place of _sanctuary_ , with their guns and poisons and malice?

It could be no coincidence that they showed themselves now, when Xavier and the rest of the X-Men were away, unable to defend the students. Like cowards they had waited until the warriors were gone in order to raid the homes left behind, to pillage and despoil and to abduct _children._ It was the most vile, the most craven abuse of power, and made all the more so because Xavier himself was forced to plead for his people not to strike back. They were not even allowed to defend themselves, not without inviting an even greater retaliation from the populace at large.

This was the vile abuse of a master taking out his rage on a servant, knowing the servant could not defend himself; this was the outrage of a grown man heaping abuse on a child too weak to resist him. This was the brutality of the tyrant, the oppressor, tormenting those they considered weak and below them in order to _keep them in their place_. And this would not _stand._

"She will be again, Piotr," Loki said grimly. "You have my word."

Loki breathed in harshly through his nose, his heart pumping, his mind racing. The X-Jet was not here, away with the X-Men wherever they had scattered to. There were no other craft that they could use to pursue the fleeing helicopter by air...

By _air._ Not for nothing was he known as Loki Sky-Treader; it was true that he had the power to walk the roads of the sky as though they were on solid ground. Even the mortals' legends of him, garbled and inaccurate as they were, still remembered that much.

The problem was that he could only _walk_ on the air. He could not _fly_ in the true sense - not as his brother did, by flinging his hammer through the air, and not as the humans did, building powerful engines to propel themselves across the sky. He would not be able to travel the sky-roads at any faster pace than he could on the ground, and that would never be fast enough to catch the raider's vessel.

Not even a horse would be fast enough, even if he had one, save for Sleipnir or another of his get. He needed some kind of craft, something his magic could bear up with him on the roads of air. Not one of their clumsy cars, too heavy and awkward, which would encase him in steel and prevent him from casting any other magic. No...

His eyes fell on the motorcycle that Logan had left behind several days before, parked up against the side of the girl's dormitory with a bright yellow metal and plastic clamp entrapping its wheel. _Perfect._

Loki crossed the distance in a few strides, braced his foot against the clamp, and kicked it off onto the ground. A spark of magic from his fingertips, similar to what he used to light the lamps in his home, was enough to start the engines with a buzzing roar. The buttons, levers and pedals that operated the machine were all unfamiliar to him, but the system of mechanics and hydraulics that operated the device was simple enough, and within a few minutes he was able to familiarize himself with the controls.

The body of the machine thrummed under his body, eager to be in motion, and Loki felt himself sliding into synch with the device as though he'd ridden it all his life. _Yes._ His magic would meld sweetly with this metal steed, carrying them both through the sky-roads with ease. He revved the engines once, testing the grip of the tires on the earth, the force of acceleration throughout the frame.

"Loki, what are you doing?" Piotr called out.

Loki grinned at him, feeling a wild giddiness overtaking his body. It hadn't replaced the rage, rather, the two of them combined together to form a sweet, terrible heat in his ribcage that urged him onwards. "What I do best," he replied, and then called to his magic. He kicked the motorcycle into gear, hit the gas, and surged gleefully ahead.

Magic entwined with machine as Loki set his mind upon the sky-roads, and the ground fell away behind him as he accelerated towards the sky; the sky, and victory. _And vengeance._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm scrambling the timeframes around again, and am not too sorry about it; this chapter combines the raid on the school from X-Men 2 (I think?) with the mutant-suppressing serum from X-Men 3.
> 
> As for why the mutant-suppressing serum worked on Loki... well, I've written meta-posts on tumblr longer than even this chapter (which was pretty long!) giving my thoughts on the relationship between normal humans, mutant humans, and other races of the Nine Realms such as Aesir and Jotunn; but the short version is that in this 'verse, the X-Gene complex that gives mutants their special abilities is an unstable, incomplete version of the gene complexes that Aesir and Jotnar contain in their full form. In Loki's case, his intrinsic shapeshifting ability was similar enough to mutant powers that the serum suppressed it, but the rest of his latent and learned abilities -- Aesir level strength and toughness, magic, and combat training -- were left intact.
> 
> The rest of the finale should be up by next week (knock on wood.)


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki catches up to the kidnappers, and Loki's past catches up to him.

Loki roared across the sky on his metal chariot, the night air unfurling around him like soft cool wings of immense blackness. He strained his senses ahead of him to catch sight of his quarry; in the face of the wind he could scent nothing, and the snarl of the engine overwhelmed any sound he might home in on. He was left with his eyes alone to track his prey, and although his eyes were sharp and their night vision acute, a black helicopter was hard to pick out against a landscape of dark sky and darker ground.

_Let there be light, then._

Rising up on his toes in the stirrups of the metal beast, steering precariously with his elbows, Loki raised his hands and made a gesture that encompassed himself, his mount, and a wide swath of air above and below. His magic stirred within him, tepid at first after its long dormancy, then rising to a rushing tide as it surged out of him. Loki had lived for many years, traveled much and seen many worlds and monsters therein, and spent just as many years perfecting the art of his illusion. It was a mastery that was put to the test, now.

From the inside it seemed as though veils of shadow, edges glimmering with starlight, had fallen about him; the huge sides heaved with imaginary breaths, the wide trailing tapestry of wings beat a steady rhythm as the creature rocked across the sky. The long, sinuous neck curved and bent, the chest swelled, and then a sizzling flash lit the air as a tremendous fireball split the darkness.

The missile of flame shot out across the sky, leaving a comet's trail of light as it forged ahead. It lit the darkness as brilliantly as a flash of lighting, and Loki saw the silhouette of the helicopter swerve and jink madly in the air as it tried desperately to escape the fireball.

It was only illusionary fire, of course, as it was only an illusionary dragon. Illyana was on that vessel, and so there was no way he was going to risk hurling a real fireball her way. But like all the best illusions, it fooled more senses than just the eyes; his foes would smell the scorch of brimstone, feel the wash of heat over their faces, and hear the bellowing roar of a predator on the hunt, the sound of the motorcycle's engine multiplied by a thousand across the sky.

The helicopter seemed to be veering to the right, turning northwards, and that would not do; Loki was bound to the sky-roads, and he could not go where they did not lead. He raised one arm and the dragon obligingly breathed another blazing fireball, this one streaking forward to detonate to the right and slightly above the coptor. It swerved again, veering back on track, and Loki began to laugh.

It came somewhere deep in his chest, hot and sweet and wicked. It was not a pleasant sound, though it contained joy and mirth in equal measure to scorn and rage. Loki pushed harder on the motorcycle's accelerator, and the engine ratcheted up a notch as the wind around him increased. The wind resistance was incredible, furious gusts buffeting him from all directions, threatening to rip even his substantial weight off his mount.

From ahead of him there came the stuttering cough of Midgardian gunfire, and the brief flash of a muzzle lit up the outline of the dark copter. Good - all the easier to find them by. The shells whistled by him, overhead and below his feet and to each side as they passed harmlessly through the dragon's illusory body. He could tell that these were no scrap-metal bullets to be stopped by a simple force-shield. They had weight and momentum that would really hurt, if they landed - at the very least, they would knock him back a long way unless he had something to brace himself against.

He had nothing solid to stand on, and he did not want for any such thing. He sought not to stop the missiles but to deflect them away, not to block but to dodge, and he danced between the howling gusts of wind and the screaming shells alike. It was a terrible dance, where one wrong step would mean utter ruin, and it was beautiful.

Between the sky-walking spell, the shields, and the massive illusion he was maintaining, Loki should have been scraping the bottom of his energy reserves long ago. Instead he found a deep well of power within himself that he had never tapped into before, a dizzying drunken freefall of limitless potential. Light and dark, life and death, earth and sky, fire and ice - he did not balance himself between them, for balance implied stillness, and he was ever moving. He flung himself from one extreme to the next and back again, always changing to fit whatever form the dance required next, and here -

 _Here_ lay his true incarnation.

No wonder he had struggled for so long to find his path, his place in the universe. Those around him had been simple souls, seeking simple exaltations. He was not. His path in life led to something far less obvious, far more arcane, although no less necessary.

Now he understood why he had always felt so out of place in Asgard - because everything he _is_ was anathema to the staid and rigid order of that power. Now, at last, he understood why his efforts had always seemed doomed to failure - why he had always been pathologically drawn to lost causes. It was his nature to ally with the weaker side of any conflict, to throw in his lot with the losing team in an attempt to even the score - just a little. And while that meant he would very often lose, every now and again he would manage to win despite all the odds, and that victory would be all the sweeter for it.

For _this_ was what it meant to be Loki. He was trickster, troublemaker, unfettered. He was the enemy of stagnation, of order, of the placid acceptance of the status quo. He was the insurgency, the revolution, the uprising. He was the disruption of hegemony, the death of complacency. And while those in power might think him evil for it, he was no less _necessary_ than they, for there could be no creation without the destruction of that which came before.

Always would he come to the aid of the weaker and lesser, regardless of the righteousness of their cause. Always would he appear in the most dire hour, bringing hope unlooked-for. He was the champion of the marginalized, of freaks and monsters, of the outcast and the underdog; he was the advocate for the Devil himself. The wild card, the shifting weather, the turn of the tide.

He was Loki.

And in this moment, he _was_ Chaos.

It would have been so, so easy, with his newfound power, to bring down the helicopter in a blast of corrosive fire. But he could not do that, for the vessel still carried Illyana, and however many more mutant children had been caught in their net. He had to find a way to force the helicopter down without crashing it.

While his illusionary dragon kept on harrying the copter, forcing it to bob and weave in the air and hampering its speed, Loki gunned the accelerator on his mount until the metal heated dangerously under his hands and the vibrations threatened to tear it apart. But it did the job; gradually he closed the distance between himself and his prey, drawing up behind and a little above the copter. Raising one hand - Jotun-blue, now a deep flickering violet in the reddish light of the dragonfire - Loki called ice.

A blast of winter flew from his fingertips, engulfing the helicopter in a small but furious blizzard. Frost formed and thickened over the windows, blocking the view of anyone inside, and ice quickly began to gather and then deepen on the spinning rotors. The axle made an unpleasant grinding noise as it fought against the ice, and the rotor blades began to sag and droop with the weight of ice upon them. Ice flowed down the side of the copter to hang in thick stalactites from the tail and skids, and the swiftly increasing weight of it forced the helicopter ever closer to the earth.

The doors of the helicopter slid open, and black-armored silhouettes leaned out of it to shoot frantically into the air. Most of them continued to waste their gunfire at the huge, menacing image of the dragon hovering over them, but at least two of them spotted Loki as well, driving his motorcycle alongside them mid-air, and aimed gunfire in his direction as well.

Loki hardly paid attention - their pitiful hand-held weapons had done little against him before, and he didn't expect that to change now - and instead concentrated on steadily thickening the layer of ice that coated the helicopter, weighing and dragging down the rotor blades. It would not be long now before the vessel was forced to land.

A ringing _clang_ and the jolting of the motorcycle beneath his legs broke Loki out of his concentration, and he looked down to see an alien object, about the size of his doubled fists, clinging to the side of the bike. It sparked and fizzed, and Loki's eyes widened with an indrawn breath as he realized its design and purpose. It was some type of volatile substance - he could smell the chemicals even from here - bundled with a powerful magnet, which clung limpet-like to the metal frame of the bike. But even the most primitive of explosives could pose a serious problem at this range, and Loki very much doubted he would be able to pry the magnet away from the metal in time.

Instead, Loki made a split-second decision, and released the motorcycle from his air-walking spell. For a moment he and the motorcycle floated in near-freefall, his hands separating from the handlebars and his legs lifting from the seat, before gravity took over and snatched the motorcycle away into a deadly parabolic arc towards the ground below.

Well, at least it hadn't belonged to him, Loki consoled himself, although whomever the motorcycle belonged to was probably not going to be thrilled when he learned of its fate.

The grenade detonated a few feet off the ground, and the resulting fireball and shockwave was quite impressive even from this height; Loki used the extra boost from the shockwave to grab onto the outside frame of the helicopter, more sheets of ice pouring from his hands as he did so. His extra weight, and the weight of the ice he brought with him, forced the helicopter to list to one side, and pulled its trajectory into a wide limping arc over the broad fire-strewn impact crater on the hillside below.

The copter shuddered as the pilot tried to right it, but Loki did not intend to give them a chance to recover. He clung to the ice with one hand and with the other, he concentrated fiercely on the training that Bobby Drake had instilled in him. Blue-white ice crept down over his forearm and wrist, solidifying into a long crystalline blade that extended outwards from his palm. It was still an inelegant thing, lumpy along the flats and jagged at the edges, but it would serve.

Loki swung his improved ice-blade over his head, thrusting it into the whirling rotor blades above. Metal met ice with a terrible grinding screech, and ice chips flew in all directions as the blade was battered; but Loki could keep re-creating the ice as long as he needed to, and the blades did not come from the clash unscathed either. Twisted, sparking metal flew off into the darkness to one side, and the helicopter lurched again and dropped a dozen feet.

With an iron-steady arm, Loki continued to lop off a foot or so at a time of the helicopter blades, the aircraft shuddering and dropping speed each time as its lift capacity was chipped away. He took a glance at the ground below them, less than twenty feet away, and gauged that this was probably as safe a height as any to make the final drop. He reversed his arm, bringing the savaged ice-sword down overhead, and plunged it straight into the motor's exhaust port.

The helicopter convulsed, coughed, and then stalled in mid-air, plummeting towards the ground below. Loki released his hold on the ice and watched it drop, making an ungraceful sliding landing on the hillside below with a teeth-grinding _crunch._

The illusory dragon, hovering overhead with a steady thunderclap of wings, had served its purpose; and so Loki dismissed it. With his boots set upon the air-paths he walked steadily downwards towards the clearing, and as he did so he called a new glamor to surround him - his old battle-armor, complete with gleaming helm, that he had worn to war so many times in Asgard. As he descended, a brief flicker of light on the sleeve of his coat caused him to reconsider, and he altered the colors of his regalia from green and gold to black and silver, the better to complement his new appearance.

The helicopter lay on its side in the round clearing in the middle of the woods, which had been blasted flat by the exploding grenade and the impact of the motorcycle. Burning pieces of strewn metal, and the small fires they had set in the grass and trees around the edge of the clearing, provided plenty of light as armored figures poured out of the door they had forced open from their downed vessel. As Loki descended into the center of the clearing they fanned out in a circle around him, aiming their guns at him and shouting threats and warnings that he barely bothered to listen to.

As his boots reached the ground Loki looked around at the soldiers surrounding him, his lip curling. None of them seemed to want to be the first to make a move or fire on him, having perhaps - _finally_ \- learned a lesson from their fellows. Well they knew that they could not take him down one at a time, or even two or four or five of them at a time; but now that they had him surrounded and pinned down under their crossfire, what could Loki possibly do to them?

What indeed.

In Asgard, Thor and his warrior friends had many times derided Loki for his reliance on illusory magic - mere tricks of light, they claimed. Illusions could not be touched, and so they could not harm you - so what good were they?

But Loki knew that an illusion did not have to touch you, to harm you; and Loki knew, better than anyone else in Asgard, that _light_ was not necessarily _good._

He raised his staff in the middle of the circle of soldiers, and light pulsed from the end of it. Just light - but light that grew brighter and brighter, and brighter yet, until the soldiers surrounding him screamed and dropped their weapons, clutching at their eyes and digging at their heads in agony.

By the time Loki shut off the light, every single one of the soldiers was left on their knees or hands and knees, groping around on the ground for their lost weapons, completely and permanently blind.

Loki stepped over their crawling bodies on his way to the wrecked helicopter, nudging a few of the fallen guns aside negligently as he went. He stepped up on the skids of the copter, his silhouette framed in the doorway, and looked down inside.

Two of the raiders had been left behind inside: one Loki guessed to be the pilot, still strapped into the seat at the helm, and another that had clearly been left behind to guard the two mutant children who huddled miserably on the floor of the helicopter. When he looked up to see Loki towering over him, and no sign of his comrades, the soldier immediately dropped his gun to the floor, raised his hands over his head, and sank to his knees.

Loki bared his teeth in a mocking smile. " _Smart_ choice," he told the man.

Just to be on the safe side, Loki froze the surrendered soldier and the pilot in place with a blast of unformed ice. Only then did he turn his attention to the two small prisoners in the corner of the cabin; only then could he afford to think about dropping his fearsome glamor, and gentling his warlike demeanor.

"Illyana," he said softly, for she was one of the children - the other was a young boy that Loki took a moment to identify, without his usual pink-and-green coloring, as Artie. "Arthur. Are you unhurt? Can you walk? We must leave this place, and return to safety."

They looked up at him, still clearly terrified - no doubt as much by the lurching unsteady landing that ended their flight, as by the kidnapping - but Artie managed to nod, and Illyana whispered, "Professor Loki?"

"Yes, it is I." Loki frowned, chewing on the inside of his cheek as he considered their situation. It was hard to tell exactly where they were, or how far they had come, but they had traveled swiftly over unfamiliar territory and it was likely to be at least a day's march back to the school, if not more. With the children, young and traumatized as they were, likely more.

If only the motorcycle had not been destroyed - but there was no use crying over it. Loki and the students were going to have to make their way over the rough terrain on foot, at least far enough to find shelter, or a place where they could call for help. His current appearance did not exactly guarantee a warm reception among the peasants of this kingdom, although Loki thought he could manage a glamor over the three of them, something to make them appear normal and harmless.

It would not be easy, though, if the countryside had been raised to high alert against their coming. His pursuit of the black helicopter across the sky had not exactly been _inconspicuous -_

As if in response to that thought, there came suddenly the roar of two more - _three_ more airborne vessels in the sky behind him, and Loki whirled around in the doorway of the helicopter as two brilliant searchlights suddenly snapped on to his position. Loki did not squint - he was not _blinded_ by so feeble a light - but it did render him unable to see whatever lay behind those lights.

He heard the descending whine of an engine that was not quite like the others, and the blast-back of air as something landed nearby. "Well, _well_ ," a dreadfully familiar voice rang out across the clearing, sardonic and cool. "Look what the cat dragged in. So tell me, what's a supervillain like you doing in a run-down joint like this?"

The glint of gold and red armor as it landed gracefully among the wreckage in the clearing only confirmed it; the voice belonged to Iron Man.

* * *

The whine of Iron Man's repulsors was hardly audible over the humming of the hovering jet, but Loki felt the _crunch_ through the soles of his feet as the metal boots met the ground. "I have to say I'm kind of surprised by how _not_ surprised I am to find you here," Stark continued talking, his voice flat and weirdly vocalized through the metal mask. "Running around causing havoc when you're supposed to be nice and securely locked up - _you?_ I think I'm going to have a heart attack and _die_ from _not surprise._ And believe me, I know heart attacks."

In his last face-to-face encounter with Iron Man, Loki had attempted to take control of him with the scepter, failed, picked him up and thrown him out of a fifty-story building. Many things had changed since that time, but one thing apparently had not: Tony Stark never did seem to _stop talking._

Not that Loki was in any particular position to object; as long as he was still prattling, he wasn't shooting. "Late to the party as always, Iron Man," Loki said with a sneer. "Showing up only when others have done all the work for you. Do you ever _wonder_ how much good you might accomplish if only you could arrive to the scene of a crisis soon enough to actually be of use?"

Stark shrugged, the movement hampered by the metal plates locking down his shoulder. "Well, there's a reason they call us the Avengers, not the Preventers," he said. "By the way, I like the blue skin, very Pandora chic. As an actual _disguise_ it doesn't amount to much, but the look does suit you, I have to say."

Loki did not deign to answer that; his eyes shifting to the space behind Iron Man to probe the darkness there. His night vision was quite strong, but with the jet spotlights shining in his eyes, he was unable to make out anything beyond them. Still, he saw no movement in the shadows behind Iron Man yet. "Where are the others?" he asked, making his voice as casual as possible.

"Counting your odds, Loki?" Stark said with a chuckle. "Never fear, the whole crew is here. Well, half of us, anyway. Natasha's back in the jet, keeping a careful lock on, and Dr. Banner is with her. Not Hulked out - at least not yet. I'm sure we'd all rather keep it that way, hmm?"

Loki relaxed at Stark's admission that Thor was not present (not that Loki expected him to be; he'd been on Asgard when Loki left, and would not have returned to Midgard without some pressing need) but tensed again at the mention of the green berserker. Loki had a justifiably high opinion of his own combat skills, but he knew that he could not stand against the Hulk in battle - indeed, he knew of no one who could save Thor himself.

If the Hulk attacked, Loki would have no choice but to flee - but he could not leave Illyana and Artie behind undefended, and thus flight was not an option. The green beast was notoriously undiscerning in his destruction; if he decided to smash his way through the wreckage of the helicopter...

No, Loki could not risk an uncontrolled melee, and neither could he flee and leave the children behind. By the same token, it was unacceptable to let himself be taken into custody and leave Artie and Illyana undefended; who knew how many more of the wretched brigands were still out there, waiting for a careless moment to strike?

So he could not fight, could not run, and could not surrender. His only choice was to try to keep the situation calm, and use his famed silver tongue to try to talk their way out of this. It was ironic that in this situation, the best chance he had in convincing them was with the truth. Loki always hated having to try to convince people of the truth; it was much easier to convince them of lies, since lies could be adapted to what the listener wanted to hear. The truth was immutable, and much less compelling.

"If you wish to avoid a bloodbath," Loki said, forcing his voice to stay calm, "then yes, by all means keep him away."

Iron Man surveyed the battlefield, his glowing eyes lighting on the fallen, twitching heaps of the unconscious soldiers. "You mean even more of a bloodbath, right?"

Loki scoffed, rolling his eyes. "Oh come now, Stark, don't be melodramatic. I spared their miserable lives, which was more than they deserved."

"Oh really," Stark said. "You wanna step into the jet, slip into some cozy restraints, and explain exactly what you mean by that?"

Despite all his attempts at careful self-control, that still caused Loki's grip on his temper to slip a bit. _"I_ need explain nothing to you. _I_ have committed no wrongs," he snarled. By the Norns, was he forever fated to play scapegoat for every disaster that happened in his vicinity, regardless of whether he had anything to do with it? "Even in this realm, it is not a crime to raise your hand in defense of oneself or one's own."

"Seriously, that's what you're going with?" Stark said with a scoff of his own. "You expect me to buy that you chased a helicopter halfway across New York State, ripped it out of the sky and trashed the entire crew in _self-defense?"_

"Not _my_ defense," Loki began, but cut off when there was a shuffling noise from behind him. Loki looked over his shoulder, saw a pale blur moving in the dimness of the helicopter, and cursed silently. He supposed he should not have expected a nine-year-old to follow orders for long.

"Professor Loki?" Illyana called up in her high, piping voice. "What's happening?"

Stark's double-take would have been quite gratifying, under any other circumstance. "Wait, what? _Professor?_ "

"Illyana, be still," Loki called out, keeping his eyes on Iron Man and the still-hovering jet. "Stay with Artie."

Predictably, his orders were not followed; Loki saw Illyana out of the corner of his eye as she crept out of the overturned helicopter. Small fingers caught and twined in the hem of his jacket as Illyana clung to his side. Her small head peeked out from under his arm, peering up at Iron Man. "Are they gonna take us away?" she asked in a high, tremulous voice. "Are they gonna experiment on us, and kill us like the Rosemary kids?"

Loki felt confident enough that Iron Man would not open fire without him making some more overtly hostile move - not with a child in the picture - to give Illyana a reassuring look and wrap his hand protectively around her shoulder. "No one is going to be taking you anywhere, Illyana, except for back to the school. No one will lay a finger on you, I swear it."

"Rosemary?" Stark said, sounding much more alarmed than he had when it was only Loki in the picture. "School? As in - oh shit. Is that - are those _mutant_ kids? Is that 'school' as in, _Xavier's_ school?"

"These are mutant kids from Xavier's school and she - did she seriously call you 'Professor?'" Artie had followed Illyana out of the helicopter, and now hovered silently behind Loki's other elbow. Iron man actually backed away a step across the turf, then turned partly away from them to key on his comm. "Uh... hold that thought a moment. _Widow, we've got a complication..."_

Stark shut off his outgoing sound in order to converse with his teammates, which left Loki with the increasingly panicked breathing of his two charges. "Breathe easy, now," he murmured to them, tightening his hands comfortingly on their shoulders. "The worst danger has passed, and help is on its way. Xavier knows of the attack on the school, and is bringing allies."

" _But does he know where to bring them to?"_ Artie wanted to know - a strikingly cogent question that Loki was just as glad Illyana could not hear.

Loki wet his dry lips with his tongue. "The worst that will happen is that you will go with the Avengers, for now," he began. "They have no quarrel with you two, and they answer to Director Fury of SHIELD, who is Xavier's ally and therefore also ours."

Neither of the children looked terribly reassured by that; Illyana's face crumpled in a way that threatened tears. "But I don't _wanna_ go with them!" she cried. "I don't _trust_ them! I wanna stay with _you!"_

Iron Man returned shortly thereafter, his faceplate now retracted so that he could speak to them face to face. Nothing seemed to have been decided, at least not conclusively, since all the man did was pick back up his inane chatter again. "So, teaching, not exactly the career path I'd expected from you," he said conversationally. "What exactly do you _teach,_ anyway? World Domination 101? Intro on How to be Evil?"

Loki leveled a withering glare at the man. _"Defense,"_ he said icily.

Illyana spoke up from beside him. "Professor Loki helps me learn about magic," she said - perhaps trying to testify in favor of her teacher against the hero. "He's the best. He knows _everything."_

"Seriously?" Stark said incredulously. "How is this even a real thing? You are _actually_ a Defense against the Dark Arts teacher at Xavier's School for Young Wizards. And _blue_ to boot, what's up with that?"

Loki narrowed red eyes at the man. "This is my natural form, mortal," he said with an icy note of warning. Stark just shrugged.

"Hey, I'm not judging," he said. "Just surprised, that's all. I guess when alien vikings _adopt_ , they really go all the way out."

Loki was kept from answering that by a new note in the sky, the approach of another aircraft from the east - several, in fact. Loki tried to keep a scowl off his face as he searched the sky; that was _not_ the sound of the X-Jet, which meant he had no idea whether it brought friend or foe.

Statistically speaking, the odds were more in favor of foe.

Stark was frowning at the sky either, but the expression on his face led Loki to suspect that he had a better idea than Loki of who or what exactly was incoming, and also that he was not entirely pleased by the new arrival. Then his attention was distracted by movement on the side of the hovering jet; a rope ladder had been extended from the cabin to the ground, and a small dark-haired figure was climbing awkwardly down it.

Loki tensed up involuntarily when the man reached the ground and turned towards them, futilely brushing his rumpled clothes into some semblance of order. _Banner._ The human form of the great beast Stark had threatened him with. What was the man thinking, coming out in the open like this? Didn't he know that there were _children_ present?

"You sure this is a good idea, Bruce?" Iron Man asked his fellow Avenger. "You can wait it out in the jet if you'd rather."

"No, I think it's better if he knows exactly who he's dealing with," Banner replied.

"Yeah, it's just that the two of you aren't exactly on the best of terms," Stark said.

Banner shot him an incredulous look. "Tony, may I remind you that _you_ were the one who literally bought an entire bar just so you could have him thrown out of it?" he said. "He knows what I'm capable of, and he won't be stupid enough to start anything right in front of me."

"There is literally nothing that I believe that man is not too stupid to attempt," Stark said. Banner flickered a smile at that, dry and bitter. "Excuse me if I don't have a lot of faith in -"

Their banter was interrupted by the arrival of a half-dozen more helicopters, cresting the ridge behind them - very familiar-looking _black_ helicopters, in the same size and style as those Loki had destroyed at the school. The pack was led by one vessel larger than the rest, the black broken up with grey metal accents and with an unfamiliar logo blazing on the side. Lines streamed downward from the helicopter, black ropes almost invisible in the darkness, and black-suited figures swarmed out and rapelled downwards.

Illyana and Artie shrank back, moving without being told to interpose Loki between them and the new enemies. Loki tensed, fingers flexing on the hilt of his staff, feeling ice and fire buzzing and crackling in his veins. He did not want to start a fight, not with the Hulk so close, but he would _not_ submit to the children being taken from him.

The last man to descend from the helicopters was not wearing black, nor weighed down by the clumsy weaponry that the others wear; as he dropped into the light it reflected silver off his hair, glinted off the many metal talismans that weigh down the front of his tunic. Old, by mortal years - weighed down with experience and authority, and while Loki is not familiar with the decorations on his sleeves and shirt he quite well knows the association between decoration and rank. Loki narrowed his eyes at the man, suspicion beginning to grow that he may have come face to face with the author of tonight's atrocities.

When his boots hit the ground he straightened up and looked narrowly around. He had a bushy white moustache and hard grey eyes, and Loki was already inclined to dislike him, but a superficial resemblance to Odin makes the dislike into something much deeper and more visceral. Somewhat to Loki's surprise, the Avengers interposed themselves between the broken helicopter and the newcomer, Iron Man out front with Banner tailing behind in a pose not too unlike Illyana's to Loki.

"Hi there, General Tad," Iron Man said as he approached the man and held out his metal glove for a handshake. "Or should I call you 'Thunderbolt' instead? Sounds kind of like a superhero codename except oh _wait_ , you don't actually have any powers. Maybe not, then."

"General Ross," Banner greeted the man, his tone more reserved and less openly insolent than Stark's, but still veiled with hostility. "What brings you out here in the middle of the night?"

Ross ignored the outstretched handshake; in fact he ignored both of the Avengers, his gaze zeroing in on Loki instead. An expression of triumph gleamed in his eyes. "So _you're_ the one who caused all this trouble," he said.

"When I started getting reports from the field that my boys were being mown down by some kind of monster - when I got a panicked radio call from one of my best fliers, the most solid and sensible pilot I know, that his craft was being chased by an unidentified creature of clearly nonterrestrial origin - I was beginning to worry we were in the middle of another alien invasion," he said. "But it was just down to you. You, who took down my best boys, who destroyed not one but three Black Hawk UH-60s, each one worth over forty million dollars of taxpayer money. You, the criminal who disrupted a highly complex and delicate military operation -"

"And I contest," Loki interrupted, his voice smooth and slick as he slid his voice into the space of the older man's breath, "that I have committed _no_ crimes, and neither you nor your Avengers have any right to detain me."

"Oh, we're not -" "Definitely not _his_ Avengers," Banner and Stark fell all over themselves to disclaim. "Definitely not."

One side of Loki's mouth curled up despite himself. Divergence in the ranks, how _useful._ "Unless," he continued as though the Avengers had not spoken, "you would care to explain before witnesses exactly what your precious _operation_ consisted of?"

Ross glowered at him, his moustache bristling forward as he set his jaw. "I don't need to answer any questions about classified military intelligence," he retorted. "Especially not when they come from known enemies of the state!"

"No, no, this is kind of my question as well," Stark interjected between them. "I'm actually _really interested_ in knowing why there's a downed U.S. military issue helicopter full of upset and frightened mutant kids, and why they are actually _clinging_ to said known supervillain for reassurance."

"Perhaps you can explain," Loki said, taking his cue from Stark's unexpected support, "just what your 'best boys' were doing trespassing onto private property into the middle of the night, breaking windows and doors, pulling my students from their beds and drugging them before hauling them off against their will?" This was a gamble, depending on the Avengers truly being as noble and fool-hearted as they proclaimed themselves to be. If they were no more than tools of the authorities in power, authorities like this iron-haired General Ross, if they were no more than fancier versions of the black-clad brigands that had broken into the school - broken into _his home -_ then this appeal would avail him naught. But if they were as naive and idealistic as Thor somehow still managed to be...

Ross transferred his gimlet glare to Iron Man instead, who met his gaze steadily. "Don't tell me you're falling for this obvious load of crap, Stark? I thought you were supposed to be a genius," he grated. "Look, just do your jobs and get this criminal out of my sight. My men will take care of making sure these kids end up just where they belong."

Illyana cried out a protest at that, and Loki heard Artie's soundless denial in his head as well, but Banner was already speaking. "No, I really don't think we'll be doing that," he said. "I don't see why we need to rely on Loki Laufeyson's account for anything. Why not just ask the kids?"

Ross scoffed. "You can't expect to take the word of an eight year old -" he began.

"I don't see why not," Stark cut him off. "Kids that age aren't generally good liars, and they were obviously first hand witnesses to the whole thing. Why don't we take all three of them together, and the little girl can explain to us what she saw?"

Ross' brusque and professional demeanor slipped for the first time, the dark shell cracking to reveal something bright and molten and ugly underneath. "No one is going to be asking that little freak for anything!" he shouted.

His words echoed in the clearing for a moment, and Loki slowly exhaled as he stood back on his heels. There was really no feeling quite so exhilarating as watching your enemy rush to destroy himself, if you only gave him room to do so.

"Why, General Ross," Banner said, his voice soft and lethal. "I have to say I'm surprised. Given your, ah, _demonstrated interest_ in the advancement of humankind, I wouldn't have taken you for a pure-species humanist."

Ross tried to backpeddle. "I'm not interested in mutant special interest politicking," he said. "I _am_ interested in potential threats to the country I serve. This little mutant enclave has been a breeding ground for terr -"

" 'Terrorist enclave?' It's a SCHOOL!" Banner interrupted, voice heavy with outrage and disbelief. "Are you telling us that you sent a group of fully armed grown men in to rough up a bunch of teenagers and adolescents?!"

"School or no school, it's also the hideout for the X-Men, one of the biggest and most dangerous radical mutant groups based in the U.S.," Ross deflected. "Of course we don't want to hurt any children, but if the terrorists choose to hide themselves behind walls made of the bodies of students, then that's their responsibility and not ours."

"Wow." Stark's voice was flat and sarcastic, utterly unamused as he stared at Ross with something like loathing. "That was super polished, right from the handbook. How many times a day do you have to pull out that excuse?"

Ross' teeth clenched, a frustrated snarl rippling his lips. "I don't have to take any of this guff from you!" he snapped. "Your precious 'Avengers' are borderline vigilantes anyway, a ragtag bunch of misfits and turncoats no better than the enemies you're supposed to be fighting! Put this damn alien in chains, and get him out of my sight - _now!_ And _that's an order!"_

Stark and Banner exchanged a look, but neither of them made a step towards Loki or the children. "Funny thing, that," Banner remarked. "Neither of us are actually in the U.S. military, and so you don't actually get to give us orders."

"Yeah, we don't answer to you," Stark piped in. "If we took orders from anyone - _not that we do -_ but if we _did,_ then it would probably be SHIELD. As it is, I really don't think that participating in government-sponsored mutant purges is the sort of business the Avengers are supposed to engage in."

As if on cue, the sky lit up from another direction as yet another buzzing noise of engines added to the din. Reflected in the hazy searchlights, Loki saw the silhouette of more helicopters pass overhead and then circle. They were black, like the military helicopters, but of another make, sleeker and more streamlined and less heavily armed. A logo glimmered on the side of the vessels that Loki could not make out from this angle.

Unlike either the Avengers' jet Ross' coterie, which still hovered overhead, these helicopters aimed themselves towards flat, uncluttered spaces at the edge of the clearing and crunched down to a landing. Now that they were down, Loki could recognize the logo on the side of the vessel as belonging to SHIELD. The side of the helicopter opened up, spilling light on the ground like blood from a wound, and a metal ramp descended to dig itself into the soft grass.

Nick Fury came striding down the metal ramp, his coat billowing dramatically behind him and casting a hazy split shadow from the multiple sources of light. Behind him, descending the ramp somewhat more slowly and carefully, was Charles Xavier.

Loki released a breath he hadn't even known he had been holding at the sight of him. Xavier was here, and so his task - at least as far as protecting the students - was as good as done. Even if Loki vanished himself from the scene at this moment, Xavier would still make sure that Ross did not have his way, that Illyana and Artie would get home safely.

For a moment he hesitated on the cusp of doing just that - but then Xavier's gaze crossed his, warm and thankful and knowing, and a fleeting touch of mental contact passed between them. _Stay a while,_ Xavier urged him. _Just listen._

"Sergeant Fury," Ross said, and he somehow managed a smile despite looking like he had something impossibly sour stuck in his throat. "Didn't expect to see you out here."

"Nor I you, Tad. And it's _Director_ Fury now," Fury said in reply, shaking his hand without a smile. "Heard there was a bit of a disturbance over at Charles' school while he wasn't in it. I follow the trail of downed helicopters and lo and behold, I find you. Care to explain how this could have happened?"

The lemon-sucking expression deepened as Ross glanced around the clearing at all the other interested parties who had gathered in a circle; Fury, Xavier, the Avengers, and of course, Loki. "Well, no, Nick, I don't think I can," he said. "I wasn't informed - that is, I wasn't part of the planning stage of this operation, I only heard about it at all when my pilots began calling in for backup due to being pursued by an unidentified hostile. Of course, none of this was planned... or authorized... by high command."

"Of course," Fury echoed, his face like granite. Behind him, Stark developed a sudden racking cough that sounded remarkably like ' _buhulshit!'_

Ross glanced at his expression from the corner of his eye, nervous sweat beginning to stand out on his forehead. "You have my guarantee that there will be a full investigation - no doubt it was the work of some overeager subordinate, mistaking his orders or taking a bit too enthusiastic initiative -"

"No doubt," Xavier agreed in a pleasant sounding voice. "You do seem to have a lot of those. I've found. Tell me, how _is_ Colonel Stryker doing these days?"

The name seemed to drop like a stone into the conversation. "Can't say that name rings a bell," Ross mumbled.

"Really?" Xavier said. "The last I had heard, he had been promoted into your chain of command, so I'd assumed the two of you have been keeping in touch."

Ross' expression had turned to stone, retreating into curt military professionalism like a turtle into its shell. "There will be a full investigation," he repeated. Then his gaze fell on Loki, and the sight seemed to rally him. "Although I think that comes in second in priority to the question of why a known supervillain is doing, running around loose after he and his army of monsters totalled New York!"

The circle of faces turned to stare at Loki, who merely lifted his chin and looked back at them coldly.

"I really, really hate to hear myself say this," Stark said, "but ol' Thunderpants over there kind of has a point. Aren't you supposed to be still locked up at SHIELD?"

"Or in Asgard," Banner seconded. "The last I heard of it was that SHIELD was planning to return you to Asgardian custody at the first opportunity."

For a moment, Loki fully expected Xavier to deny any association with him - to claim, as Ross had, that he knew nothing of Loki and that his actions were as chaotic and unwelcome as the supervillain they still all believed him to be. But only for a moment; in the next moment Xavier had put a hand under his elbow, looked at the Avengers and said calmly: "Loki was acting on my behalf and with my full support."

He nodded towards the children, still clinging to Loki's side. "When I learned that an attack was underway at the school, I contacted Loki and charged him with the responsibility of protecting the students. Which he has done, outstandingly so, and I am both proud and grateful to him for it."

Loki felt such a flush of warmth rise through his hands and flood up through his neck and face, that he was for a moment sure that the serum had worn off and he was returning to his Aesir skin. But no; the skin that gleamed in the searchlights was as blue as it had ever been. He swallowed hard around a sudden lump in his throat, and tried not to blink too rapidly.

Ross' eyes gleamed with a much less savory light. "So, the mutants have struck up an alliance with alien fugitives now?" he spat. "As though any more proof was needed that you were working to undermine and overthrow normal human beings, now we have proof of collusion with condemned criminals!"

"Neither a fugitive nor a condemned criminal," Xavier replied calmly. "Though it was not widely known on Earth, Loki was actually granted a pardon by his brother Thor, acting regent of Asgard, in exchange for assistance he provided regarding a threat of interdimensional disruption from another realm. That threat was taken care of safely last fall, with no more harm done to Earth than a few destroyed buildings in Greenwich."

Banner started with realization. "I was following the news on that," he said, blinking hard. "I'd heard that Thor had been sighted on the scene, but there was no mention of anyone else from Asgard."

"Oh, well, if _Thor_ says his little brother is free to go, I guess no one could possibly question his objectivity in the matter," Stark said with heavy sarcasm. "But last time I checked, Thor wasn't king of Earth, which is where his crimes actually took place -"

Technically, in fact, he was; the All-Father's jurisdiction extended over all nine realms, including Midgard. But this did not seem to be the time to point that out, so Loki just watched.

" - Shouldn't SHIELD at least be _trying_ to arrest him?" Stark looked appealingly at Fury, who shook his head with a sigh.

"As a matter of fact, Mister Stark, Loki was transferred into my rehabilitative custody months ago by Nick Fury, before he ever left the Helicarrier," Xavier said calmly. "He's been doing quite well since then, up until tonight's hostilities, which I believe we have established were _not_ instigated by him."

There was a short pause as this was digested. At last Banner said, "I'm - look, I'm sorry to say this, Professor Xavier, but I'm really not comfortable with this. Legal loopholes aside, Loki was responsible for a great number of deaths and a huge amount of destruction on his last visit to Earth. Someone who could do something like that in cold blood can't be allowed to walk free, no matter what favors he's offered to do in exchange for that freedom."

There was a short pause, and then Xavier cleared his throat. "It may interest you to know, Doctor Banner, that during the time period in which Loki was under my custody for treatment following the invasion of New York, I discovered some very interesting artificial mental alterations on his psyche."

"Artificial what now?" Stark asked.

"His mind had been tampered with, by a similar artifact as the one used to control Clint Barton," Xavier explained. "It was never his decision to attack the Earth, or to steal the Tesseract."

Loki kept his poker face, but it was an effort to keep from laughing out loud at Xavier's sly bit of disingenuousness. Both statements were true, certainly, but by placing them together in that way he implied a much greater degree of impairment to Loki's autonomy than had actually been the case.

Stark looked over at Fury for confirmation, one eyebrow rising skeptically. "Is that true, Fury-baby?" he asked.

Fury had an extremely saturnine expression on his face, but he must not have felt like starting a fight with Xavier today, because he only grunted "More or less."

"All this is no more than a diversion," Loki broke in, his voice cold. "An attempt to shift attention off of the _real_ matter at hand, which was the unprovoked attack on the school."

Ross bristled. "I have three downed helicopters on my hand and at least two _dozen_ casualties," he claimed stridently. "I think I can say that's all the _provocation_ I need!"

"You cannot possibly claim after the fact -" Loki started, but Xavier interrupted him.

"A moment," he said, and turned his attention back to Ross. "Please help me out here. When you say 'casualties,' are you using the word in the sense of _deaths,_ or of _injured_ personnel only _?"_

Ross ground his teeth, but clearly knew better than to tell an outright lie in the presence of a powerful known telepath and the director of SHIELD. "Injuries," he said sullenly. "But the casualties are still being tallied - and there are more soldiers who are still MIA, we haven't yet confirmed their status -"

"And the number of _confirmed_ fatalities?" Xavier continued relentlessly.

Ross didn't answer, so Fury did it for him. "Zero," he said. "At least according to the cleanup teams I've got down there so far."

The atmosphere notably changed at that news, both of the Avengers looking at Loki in an interested new light. "Zero fatalities?" Stark exclaimed. "Are you fucking kidding me? _Zero_ fatalities? I've seen PBR training exercises with a higher mortality rate than that. You're telling me that you sent a squad of fully-armed commandos into a hostile environment to kidnap a bunch of superpowered teenagers and nobody died _at all?_ "

"This is not exactly helping to sell your 'oh those mutants are so dangerous, we have to suppress them for our own protection' case, you know," Banner observed mildly. He glanced over at Loki. "I guess there was something to the Professor's recommendation, after all."

"Yeah, looks like the leopard really _can_ change his spots," Stark said. "Or... blue stripey markings, whatever."

Ross' apparent blood pressure had been rising steadily throughout the conversation, his face turning an unhealthy shade of purple. "Cut the bullshit!" he screamed. The last of the civil facade melted off, leaving only the ugly molten rage and hatred beneath. "Enough of this waffling! That... _thing_ over there is a dangerous enemy, and he needs to be locked up and burn the fucking key!" He leveled a finger towards Loki, shaking in rage. "And those - those _deviations_ hiding behind him, they're just as bad! It's all an act, the cute little PR face, spinning up public opinion on their side to shield them while they creep around in the shadows, poisoning and corrupting decent human beings - they _all_ need to be put down, every single last one of them, and if none of you have the balls to do what needs to be done to protect this country, then - "

"I think that's enough," Fury broke in, his voice flat and harsh enough to cut through Ross' unhinged ranting. He placed a hand on Ross' shoulder that looked companionable, but Loki was close enough to see the bones of his knuckles shine pale through his skin from the force as he squeezed. Ross' words cut off into a silent scream, his knees buckling under the pressure of Fury's hand.

Fury looked directly at the Avengers, Banner and Stark and the still-hovering jet. "This is going to be a Department of Defense internal matter," he said, "and not really part of the Avengers' jurisdiction, don't you think?"

"Hell, I thought that twenty minutes ago," Stark said.

"I don't think I'm going to be needed here," Banner said. "Or... the Other Guy, either."

"Thank you for your time and care," Xavier told them pleasantly. "As ever, your devotion to protect the public is appreciated."

"Yeah... you too, Malcom X. Watch your back," Stark told him, and then turned away. His faceplate clicked closed, and his repulsors bloomed hot in the dimness as the suit shot away upwards. Banner shook his head and sighed, apparently for his teammate's theatrics, and then went back to the ladder leading up to the jet to depart in a slightly less spectacular manner.

Only once the Avengers' jet had turned away, its engines revving to a roar, did it seem to occur to a shaken Ross that he had been left essentially undefended against the combined powers of Loki and Xavier. He had been edging steadily towards his own helicopter, trying to avoid notice, when Loki stepped forward and gripped his shoulder hard. "One moment," he said, his voice edged with false courtesy.

Ross turned a glare on him that was full of hatred and the promise of vengeance. "I'm not interested in anything you have to say, alien filth," he spat out. "You may have fooled those idiots the Avengers, but you won't fool me."

"Oh, I don't doubt," Loki said. "You will in no way be dissuaded from your notion that I am an enemy and a villain, so I will not waste my time trying to convince you otherwise. But I wanted to make certain that we were on the same page, as it were."

Ross tried to pull his arm free, but Loki only gripped it more tightly. "You may leave this field today bearing even greater hatred for mutants in your heart," he said conversationally. "When you are facing the ruin and humiliation that you have so richly earned, the thought may come to you to blame mutants for your downfall. You may find yourself ever more determined to get back at them, to revenge yourself upon them for the harm you perceive they have done to you."

He leaned in close and his voice dropped to a hiss. "So let me just make this crystal clear: the mutants and the school are under _my_ personal protection, and if you ever set one slimy foot near them again, I _will_ put an end to your miscreant deeds." Ice bled from his fingers, bitter cold biting deep into the bones of Ross' shoulder. "You will _not_ be able to stop me. No assassins you send can kill me, no army you put in my way will slow me down. I am Loki, born of Jotunheim, warrior-mage of Asgard, protector of mutants of Midgard, and I will descend on you with the fury of three realms if you _dare_ to cross me again!"

With a mighty effort, Ross wrenched free of Loki's grip. He cradled his left arm in his right one, apparently unresponsive to his efforts to move it, and turned desperately towards Xavier. "You - control your pet monster!" he demanded with a gasp.

Xavier looked at him with surprised pity. "General, I don't pretend to control a force of nature," he said. "If he abides by my wishes, it is only because he _chooses_ to do so."

"Indeed," Loki said. "Xavier has made clear his wish that I do not kill you or your brigand scum, however richly you may deserve it. So I will not kill you." He leaned in again, looming directly in Ross' field of vision, capturing the mortal's eyes with his own. "But remember, General, that _I can make you wish that I would."_

The deadlock held for a long moment; it was Ross that broke it, dropping his head and looking away. Fury stood on the side, arms crossed and unmoving, obviously not intending to intervene as well. Shaken and shattered, Ross stumbled away from them towards his helicopter.

"General," Fury called to him, moments before he could reach his helicopter. "Just in case you were thinking of it, keep in mind that a hospital full of soldiers and two hundred million in trashed equipment is a little too much for even someone of your rank to sweep under the rug. There _will_ be an investigation, and it's not gonna be headed by you. You might want to consider, when the axe is ready to come down, whether that general's badge of yours is going to be big enough to cover your ass _and_ Stryker's... or whether it's time to cut your losses where your little Humanity First crusade is concerned."

Ross paused a moment, his shoulders slumping, but he didn't respond any further as he fled from the scene of battle.

* * *

Though the night was dark and the countryside was largely empty, it was _not_ completely free of observers. On the far side of a ridge not quite ten miles away, out of sight of all but the most dedicated of searchers, a small group was watching the last of the confrontation wind down.

"It looks like it's all over now," reported one young man, watching through a pair of long-range night-vision binoculars. His bright ginger hair was a splash of lighter color against the dark undergrowth, and he played restlessly and constantly with a small lighter in his hands. His name was John Allerdyce, and he was a mutant, but not one of Xavier's; he had long ago left behind the petty world of the humans and embraced the true potential of his genes.

His companion was much better suited to blend into the darkness, her skin a midnight blue color broken only by the bright gold color of her eyes. She snorted in disgust. "Figures... you can't count on humans to do anything right," Mystique exclaimed.

It had been such an elegant plan, too. They had waited for all the troublesome X-Men to clear out of the way before a disguised Mystique had tipped off to William Stryker, ever foaming at the bit to crack down his baton, the location of the unguarded school. Then, the Brotherhood's strike team had positioned themselves in ambush formation along the helicopter's flight path. They had only to wait for the helicopters to pass overhead before Magneto would pull them down, peel the vessels open like tinfoil and the Brotherhood would kill all the soldiers inside.

All that would be left would be the kidnapped mutants - poor, shivering, traumatized mutants whom the Brotherhood would reassure and comfort. _See, it's safe now, the bad men won't hurt you any more. Back to the school? Oh no, I'm afraid it's not safe there any more. Look at this, the humans kidnapped you right from your beds. Better come with us for now, somewhere the evil humans will never be able to hurt you again..._ Just like that, the Brotherhood of Mutants would gain a whole crop of promising recruits, and their two biggest enemies would be set at each other's throats, bleeding out their strength tearing each other apart.

But their grand scheme had completely flopped; of the three strike teams the humans had sent, only _one_ had escaped from the school at all, and that one had made it almost to the ambush point before being pulled out of the sky by Xavier's pet alien. What a _waste_ of a good opportunity.

Magneto chuckled, a deep rich sound in the darkness, as he shifted comfortably from his seat on the ground. "Don't fret, my dear," he told her. "Today's plan might have failed, but _our_ involvement remains a secret. We have lost nothing from it, and gained valuable knowledge about our opponent's abilities."

Mystique scowled at the distant hillside, still burning brightly with searchlights and the burning wreckage of the downed helicopter. What beautiful destruction it had been! "They should be added to _our_ capabilities," she said angrily. "We should have taken him up on his alliance when we had the chance!"

"Alliance?" Magneto shook his head. "Oh no, my dear, he never really intended to ally with us, not for a moment. Look at the way he defended the school, but managed not to kill a single human in the process! He's Charles' boy, heart and soul."

Mystique sighed in agreement, and regret for the loss of what could have been. With one last disgruntled glance back at the chaos behind them, the mutants disappeared into the darkness.

* * *

"Well, I guess it's time for me to pack it in as well," Fury said, as the last of the military choppers faded into the darkness. "I've got a full night's work ahead of me, sweeping broken pieces of this mess into the bin, shipping busted-up soldiers to the military hospital in Albany."

"You cannot possibly expect me to apologize," Loki challenged him, "all things considered."

Fury glared at him for a moment with one eye, then waved it away with a huge sigh. "No, I suppose not. Suppose you two'll want to get back to the school as soon as possible, to oversee the cleanup." He glanced downwards, taking in Illyana and Artie, who had only now relaxed enough to creep out from Loki's shadow. Artie had made a beeline for Professor Xavier's side, and sat communicating with him over a telepathic wavelength; but Illyana had stuck close to Loki. "You four."

"I believe you made an offer to provide us with transportation, Director?" Xavier asked him, with just a hint of an edge to his voice.

Fury nodded. "I figured a helicopter ride wouldn't really be appealing right now," he said, his glance shying away from the two children. "So I've got a driver coming up with an ATV to take you back home."

 _Home._ Was it really, Loki wondered? For so long he'd thought of Asgard as his home, that in a free-association test the word would always still call up images of golden spires and wide-spaced hallways. Could _home_ also be a modest apartment with a kitchen full of plastic appliances and bi-colored walls, concrete walkways and ivy-covered buildings and broad dusty lecture halls? Was it possible to have more than one home at once?

Was it really possible for a creature like him to have any?

"Home?" Illyana said, looking up from her distraction at the word. Her little face was painted with exhaustion, and her voice was wistful. "Can we go home now? _Please?"_

 _"Are we really sure it's safe to go with SHIELD?"_ Artie asked, glancing worriedly between Fury and Xavier.

"Of course," Xavier told him with a smile. "I'll be with you the whole way, and Professor Loki too. I very much doubt they'd be so unwise as to try a double-cross with the two of us both present."

He didn't follow this up with a pointed look at Fury, but then, he didn't really need to. Fury just shook his head again, divesting himself of all responsibility for crazy mutants and their affairs, and wandered back towards his own helicopter. The sound of the departing chopper mixed with the sound of a car engine grinding up the hill, swishing its way through the undergrowth: Fury's promised ride.

The driver was a nondescript young woman in a SHIELD uniform, who stared a little bug-eyed at Loki's appearance but quickly caught herself and looked away, busying herself with getting Xavier and the children safely into the vehicle. Loki glanced down at his hands, self-conscious for the first time in hours about his altered appearance.

How long would the drug last? If it had not passed through his system and vanished already, like other poisons, Loki found he really could not anticipate. What if he could _never_ change back, what if he was condemned to this appearance forever? As far as he had come in the past few months at accepting his true form, the thought still was like a flood of ice down through his chest and into his heart.

He looked up from his contemplation of his hands to meet Xavier's gaze; Xavier, no doubt, had sensed the direction of the thoughts. "I've seen this serum in use before - never on aliens, of course," Xavier said quietly. "The effects _will_ wear off in time; on some mutants the suppression effect lasts only a few weeks, on others it can last for months. But it always fades in the end. I promise you that."

Loki nodded. He trusted in Xavier's word... but more than that, he trusted in Xavier's fidelity. Even if the poison never faded from him, even if he remained frozen in this icy skin for the rest of his life... then there would always be one place he could go where he would be welcome, where no eyes would look upon him with fear or hate for the appearance of his skin. There would always be one place he could go where he belonged.

And that, he supposed, was as good a definition of _home_ as any.

"Yes," Loki said. "Let's go home."

* * *

~the end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sure people wondered why only half the Avengers were present in this scene, so I'll just go ahead and say it:
> 
> 1- Thor is not there because his extremely complex relationship with Loki, and Loki's with Asgard, would (and will) require an entirely separate fic to deal with, and there would not be time or space to deal with it here.  
> 2- Steve is not there because there is a plot point in the upcoming next fic in the series that require him to not be present for this scene, and also because he and Tony would probably clash again over which direction the leadership of the Avengers should take in this situation.  
> 3- Clint is not there because his personal issues with Loki would make coming to an accord exponentially more difficult.
> 
> In a more general sense the other Avengers are not present because the scene was already too crowded and too busy with a lot of people with very strong personalities trying to get their say in. Tony acts as a representative for all the Avengers here; kicking off Avengers 2 by having the Avengers start to fight with each other over what ought to be done would not be helpful. That would turn this chapter into a story about the Avengers and Their Stance On The Mutant Problem, and that really just is not what this fic is about.
> 
> To sum up: if Iron Man 3 can have Tony and Rhodey embark on a mission to rescue the president without ever calling Steve, if Captain America 2 can have Steve and Natasha go the entire movie without ever bothering to try to secure the help of Tony or Clint, if absolutely no one in Thor 2 can be assed to take five minutes to alert SHIELD or any other authority on Midgard about their impending apocalypse, then I feel I am not doing them a disservice by having less than the entire team present on a call about a dragon chasing a helicopter across upstate New York.
> 
> So if it makes you feel any better, just imagine that:  
> 1- Thor is still on Asgard because Loki as 'Odin' didn't release him from his duties in this timeline.  
> 2- Clint is on a mission out of the country.  
> 3- Steve forgot to charge his phone and is going to have ten missed 'Avengers Assemble' calls the next time he remembers to check it.


	11. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Memorial Day at Xavier's school.

 

It was a warm and beautiful day near the end of May, four weeks after the raid in the night that had thrown the life of the school into chaos. Much had been healed since then; the front wall of the girls' dormitory had been repaired, along with the cracked and shattered tiles from where the helicopters had set down upon the school grounds. People, too, had healed since then; most of the students had suffered no worse than a few sprains or bruises, and shaken nerves that the forceful rebuff of the raid had done much to bolster. The return of Xavier to the school, and the X-Men, also did as much to soothe the frightened students as the ripening green and softly blooming heat of the oncoming summer.

 

The sun was lowering, but the soft humidity in the air made it prone to hold its warmth, and Loki was glad to be back in his Asgardian form for it. The effects of the serum had faded over time, as Xavier had promised, and he could shift skins with ease once more. He had become much more comfortable with his Jotun skin over the past few months -- and even more so the past few weeks -- but today, for this, he wanted to be in his Aesir seeming.

 

The fine weather was especially welcome, for today the last monday of May was a festal day -- Memorial Day, the others called it. Mostly it seemed to be taken as an excuse to take the day off from class and from teaching duties, to pour out of the stuffy halls and dormitories and lounge around on the lush greens, basking in the sun. Portable outdoor stoves and ovens were being set up, too; apparently this holiday had a feasting component to it as well, which seemed amusingly Asgardian to Loki.

 

He had a good view of the festivities from his current perch -- the top of the lecture hall, a small flat plateau at the very pinnacle of the arching dome. There were no stairs or maintenance hatchways up this high, making it a difficult vantage to reach for those without extensive ladders -- or the power of air-walking. (Or teleportation, or flight, which actually included a fair amount of the student body.) Right now, though, he had the place to himself -- with one exception.

 

"Are you sure?" Kurt asked, his voice soft with concern. "I can go back down, if you'd rather be alone for this. It is a ceremony of your people, after all."

 

"No," Loki said. "No, you can stay. --Please," he added.

 

Kurt nodded wordlessly and sat down to perch on the edge of the dais, watching quietly. Loki found himself drawing support from his presence even so -- just knowing that he was not entirely alone.

 

He stood facing east so that the setting sun was behind him, casting a long shadow across the roof. Before him, the eastern sky was already darkening to twilight, the horizon vanishing into powder-soft blues and greys.

 

Loki held out one hand and sent his thoughts down into the atrium below, where he had spent so many hours lecturing, teaching, performing to the students here. He called forth the image of Yggdrasil that he had cast many times, its shimmering twisting form hanging half-manifest in the air even once he had stopped maintaining the illusion. That was often the way of it, with images of the Tree; they tended to take on a life and substance of their own, since in a way they were always there, in every place, simply waiting to be revealed by the right eyes.

 

This time he kept going, not stopping the growth of the illusory Tree until it reached the pinnacle of the dome and pushed right on through the roof. The result was a shimmering, ghostly branch of the Tree that sprouted before him on the roof like a shrub; under the direction of his magic, Winter passed to Spring all at once. Colorless flowers bloomed and faded, delicate leaves unfurled from every twig, and at last the swelling calix nestled at the heart of the branch opened and gave a shimmering globe of white light into his hands.

 

Loki reached out and took the globe in both hands, hovering just centimeters above the skin of his palms. He released the spell and the rest of the Tree faded away into glitter, but the globe remained, pulsing white and perfect in his hands.

 

He took a deep breath and shut his eyes, and summoned his earliest memories.

 

_Warmth, golden, light, softness, dark and light, dark and light, golden hair curled in his fist, wide-arched corridors, decorated ceiling so far over his head, the sweep and fall of skirts, fall, cry, unfair, Mother, gentle melodic humming, sweet smell of perfume, softness of her hand, the shape of her face, Mother, her smile, the color of her eyes, Mother Mother Mother --_

 

Once he had started he found he could not stop; it was like opening a floodgates inside him, bursting forth with the force of hundreds of years of pent-up emotion. He had guarded himself against the remembering for so long that the pain of letting-go, the pain of unclenching himself from around the memories was almost as great as the loss itself had been. But this was what was needed, he knew, as much as he shied away from that knowing. The letting-go.

 

As the memories poured through him, chaotic and unstoppable, he found his mind suddenly and strangely clear -- a pool of calm deep water inexplicably found between two rushing currents. He found that he was even able to shape words to the occasion, to speak them out in clear and steady voice from his heart.

 

 _Mother,_  he called into the nothingness. _Today, I remember you._

 

_They say this is a day for honoring sacrifice, but I do not honor your sacrifice. It was not your death that saved the Realms, it was your life. Your strength of will, your bravery, your wisdom and power. I will not honor your sacrifice because that would be to say that your death was necessary, that your death had purpose, and that is a lie so vile that even I spit out the taste of it._

 

_No good has been brought to the universe through your death. The worlds are poorer without the wealth of your wisdom. The worlds are darker without the light of your beauty. The worlds are colder without the warmth of your kindness._

 

_But they are still there. Because of your triumph, your great victory, the Tree still stands. Because you lived, the sun still rises; and so long as the sun rises, new life is born, new beauty can grow. Because you loved me, because you took me in, I am alive. I am your son. I live, and every day that I live, I will strive to be a son who would make you proud._

 

He opened his eyes at last, and a choked half-laugh gurgled up from his throat. Because the glowing sphere of light in his hands, the one born of his own magic and infused with his own memories, was not the vivid green of his own magic. It was blue, pure and clear, the exact shade of his mother's _seidr_  that he had never been able to perfectly mimic.

 

He took a deep breath, filling his lungs past the burning in his throat, and tipped his head up to the sky. There was no funeral boat, no archers to loose the flame-arrows, but he needed them not; when he held up his hands and opened his palms, the bright ball of magic and memories took flight from his hands like a bird, upwards and away into the sky.

 

_Mother, I love you._

 

_Mother, I will not forget you._

 

_Mother, good-bye._

 

With his head tilted upwards, the tears did not fall. He stayed where he was, watching the bright globe of light rise towards the darkening sky until the first stars began to prick through; until even his sharp eyes could no longer distinguish the glimmering point of magic from the stars behind it.

 

Then he turned away. Kurt was still there, watching the sky along with him; when Loki moved, he looked up at him and smiled. A cool gust of air blew across them, bringing with it a snatch of song. Loki walked over to the edge of the roof beside him and looked down over the campus. A group of people had gathered on the open green below them, in the long shadow cast by the auditorium. A hundred points of light glimmered from the crowd, candle-flames held between careful hands, and Loki was reminded that many at the school had beloved dead, as well.

 

In this way as well as so many others, now, he was not alone; no matter how bereaved and lonely, he was no longer alone.

 

From elsewhere on the campus he caught a whiff of smoke, rising from the barbecues and grills that had been set out in the plaza: the smell of roasting kine, and pork, and lamb met his throat when he inhaled deeply. They were fitting, he thought, for funeral meats, the feast that the living partook in honor and celebration of the dead.

 

"Come," he said to Kurt, who stood up and dusted off the legs of his trousers. "Let us go down, and feast with the others."

 

 

* * *

 

 

~the end.


End file.
